From Restoration to Interpretation: Historical Memory in the Architecture of Renato Rizzi

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This article analyzes one of the key debates in 21st-century architecture—the integration of contemporary architecture within historical urban fabric and the relationship between cultural heritage and modernity—through two projects by the Italian architect Renato Rizzi: “Casa Museo Depero” (1992–2008, Rovereto, Italy) and the “Gdańsk Shakespeare Theatre” (2004–2014, Poland). Although functionally different, both projects are united by Rizzi’s conceptual approach, which is based on a critical dialogue with the material and immaterial layers of the past. In the first case, the research examines the restoration and adaptation of interior space within an existing medieval structure, while in the second case it explores the abstract reconstruction of cultural memory on the site of a former Elizabethan theatre. The study demonstrates that for Rizzi, historical architecture is not a static heritage object or a museum artifact, but a living process that generates new architectural forms and meanings through interpretation. The comparative analysis reveals that in both projects historical metaphors are synthesized with contemporary technologies and architecture. As a result, Rizzi’s architecture is simultaneously contextual and contrasting, transforming historical reference into a contemporary spatial narrative. The “Gdańsk Shakespeare Theatre” integrates three fundamentally different systems: the architectural interpretation of historical memory, technologically driven architectural form, and open urban space designed for social and cultural interaction. The research concludes that Rizzi rejects superficial historicism and formal imitation, proposing instead an interpretative architectural strategy in which history is understood as a living text. Through rereading and translating this text into contemporary architectural language, his projects establish architecture as a mediator between past and present, memory and innovation, tradition and modernity.