Restoration and reuse of the Old Church of Santa Maria di Costantinopoli

Old Church of Santa Maria di Costantinopoli ,Rione Trieste, Somma Vesuviana Metropolitan City of Naples, Italy.

Creative Re-Use

The old church is currently ravaged by many events such as earthquakes, wars, and neglect

Our idea was to reuse the old structure destroyed by these outer events in something that could tell a story of the time in which it existed and continues to exist. The first idea was to leave as is the part already destroyed, to conserve its own destruction as a way of telling the story that the church had passed over the years. this will be shown by its coating layers, we will show the truth of the material, which can withstand all these environmental, social and economic changes during this time.

we create environments that will adapt to the day-to-day lives of the people of the region. pulpit for cultural and religious presentations, a kitchen for the installation of a cafeteria, a lighting installation that represents the Festa della Lucerne, public area, cultural library, and an entrance.

This is the “Festa delle lucerne”, with its ancient origins and certainly of pagan derivation. It takes place in the medieval village of Casamale, (Somma Vesuviana) where the imposing Collegiata of Santa Maria della Neve takes place, and consists in exchanges of visits between the inhabitants, but above all, in the adobe of the ancient alleys with ferns and chestnut branch, also realizing a thick vegetal covering of the streets that will be the theater of representation. The event begins at sunset, when a man or a woman “‘or mast” and party “lights up, with a candle, a first lamp, between general applauses: it is the way for the lighting of all the others, and for the opening of the water for the fountains. Not lacking food and wine, partly placed on the table of puppets, and left there, the rest is offered to visitors. Thus the ritual is perpetuated every evening of the event. Meanwhile in the solemn church, the statue of Our Lady of the Snow has already been exposed to general devotion; on the evening of 5 August, on its anniversary, the statue will be carried in procession, at the sound of the band, stopping in appropriate places where ancient devotional songs will be heard, intonation hidden by female voices, without any instrumental accompaniment, in an almost magical suggestion, as if those notes were born from nothing. (LA Festa delle Lucerne. Available in: www.iniziazioneantica.altervista.org/napoli_esoterica/lucerne/festa_delle_lucerne.htm>. Acess on: 05 june. 2018. )

Looking at this image that sums up how the installation of the lights of the Festa della Lucerne, we have seen that the old church’s roof structure looks like this. Howsoever, we decided to make the festival museum in the existing roof structure. We put LED lights to create this transcendental ambiance.

Share on Facebook