The SPIRA (Integrated Planning Services for Architectonic Restoration) studio was set up in Florence in 2001 by Giuseppe Cruciani Fabozzi and Massimo Marrani, following a period of close collaboration on projects since 1997, some of which are included on this site.
In July 2004, to respond to the growing complexity of services required by the sector, the partners founded SPIRA srl, a engineering firm with the skills and capabilities to deal with the multiple “segments” in the process of rehabilitating the built historic heritage – from preliminary studies to final inspections – thanks to constant updating in the field, of their personal know-how and the cooperation with various specialists and research centres.
Moreover, the confidence with the difficulties inherent to public works, matured through the Technical Directors’ thirty years’ of experience, has endowed SPIRA srl with a heightened capability to deal both with the technical and administrative sides of the interventions, including those aspects relating to site safety planning, building programs and pricing schedules. It should also be noted that SPIRA’s internal management system was judged and certified in 2005 by Bureau Veritas Italia Spa (certificate n. 167233), to be in conformity with ISO 9001:2008 regulations.
The approach
The approach, fruit of an experience in design work and building sites accumulated in these twenty years of activity (which constitutes the common denominator) aims to establish, with solutions that meet the criteria of compatibility and distinctness, an effective symbiosis between historical context and contemporary interventions. An approach hinged on the application of a rigorous "architectural philology" and a thorough examination of the structure and materials of a built organism documenting every sign, no matter how tenuous, of a buildings 'life', so as not to compromise, with uninhibited "maintenance", its recognition or historical value.
From such an approach, which assigns to the role of reference constructed historical identity of places, derives the rejection the idea of "renovation" as the inconsiderate re-use of built resources or nonchalant creative "gestures" but also the aversion to identify restoration as the reestablishment of the alleged "original" physiognomy at the expense of an environments historical stratification.
The "philosophy" presiding over the choices of the principle of the interventions described here is founded on the belief that the primary task of restoration is to give voice to the "traces" that testify to the multiplicity of the construction phases and uses of a building. Employing the data acquired from multiple investigations in the field, not as safe conduct for questionable "restoration" and " stylistic completions", but as a starting point for the search of a "correct" complementary relationship between "ancient" and "new", so as to establish an effective dialogue between existing and additions required by the change of use, considering them, according to the Corbusian metaphor, as '' architecture of accompaniment."
The Firm’s QUALITY MANAGEMENT system complies with ISO 9001:2008 standards, certified by BUREAU VERITAS (certificate n. 167233), for Architectural and Civil engineering services, design, site supervision and safety coordination.
