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About Us |
The International Conservation Center, Citta di Roma |
Architectural and historic conservation has become an issue of growing concern and focus in Israel. New regulations and legislation have led to the need for trained personnel, to work alongside architects and public institutions to devise and uphold accepted standards of historic preservation.
To help meet these needs, the Israel Antiquities Authority, the Old Akko Development Company, and the Akko Municipality joined forces in 2005 and founded the International Conservation Center. The Center is situated in the Old City of Acre, which is a veritable living laboratory for the study and practice of conserving historic sites and structures.
The continued development of the center is due to fruitful cooperation between the Israel Antiquities Authority and the Italian Government, the Cultural Ministry. In 2009 the mayor of Rome Giovanni Alemano decided to devote the prestige "Dan David" award to the Center as a commemoration of the Italian activities in San Giovanni di-Acre during the Middle Ages. This collaboration provides the Center the advantage of highly trained specialist and consultants from Italy and contributes to the future conservation in Israel by the development of professional human sources conservation infrastructure.
The Center's main goal is to provide training in all preservation and conservation professions. Programs focus on both the theoretical and the practical aspects of conservation. The Center serves as a place of study for researchers in the field, as well as for architectural students, from Israel and abroad, providing them with hands-on conservation experience. Additional programs and activities reflect and feature Acre's rich cultural heritage, and open up new employment opportunities for the city's residents.
The building of the International Conservation Center is situated on the southern edge of the Old City of Acre, next to the city wall, in a building that offers remarkable views of Haifa Bay.
It is a spacious, two-storey, 19th century residence, with an area of 1,000 square meters. The building's massive pillars and impressive supporting vaults, suggest that part of the structure may date back to the Crusader Period, when this sector formed part of the autonomous Pisan Quarter.
The upper floor, which once housed one of the wealthy families of Acre, is replete with architectural elements typical of a Lebanese house, i.e., a central hall plan, where the rooms open to face a central salon, which is decorated with marble floors, pillars and decorative wooden ceilings.
In recent decades, the building housed a youth hostel, later vacated. Neglect and improper use have damaged the structure and its special features. Various training programs focus on practical and artistic conservation of the architectural elements in the building itself.
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