ICCH9: 9th International Congress on Construction History Politecnico di Torino Turin, Italy, June 28-July 2, 2027

What is ICCH9?What is ICCH9?

The 9th International Congress on Construction History (ICCH9) will be held June 28 – July 2, 2027, at Politecnico di Torino, Italy.

The ICCH9 will bring together researchers from different disciplines and continents to exchange recent advances, results, and insights in the vast and expanding field of Construction History. Special topics will be discussed in dedicated Thematic Sessions organized and chaired by leading experts, while the scope and diversity of Construction History will be reflected in the Open Sessions.

Researchers from all fields connected to Construction History are invited to submit abstracts of contributions for ICCH9.

Submission GuidelinesSubmission Guidelines

All papers must be original and not simultaneously submitted to another journal or conference.

• Abstracts: Must be submitted in English, not exceed 400 words, and be submitted exclusively via the conference website link. Delayed submissions or those sent via email/paper will not be considered.

• Full Papers: Will be rigorously peer-reviewed by the Scientific Committee. Only papers fully meeting the scientific and language quality criteria will be accepted. Please note that only papers presented in person at the conference will be included in the proceedings.

CommitteesCommittees

Chairs

• Maria Luisa Barelli (Politecnico di Torino)
• Valentina Burgassi (Politecnico di Torino)
• Edoardo Piccoli (Politecnico di Torino)
• Cesare Tocci (Politecnico di Torino)
• Mauro Volpiano (Politecnico di Torino)

Organisation Committee

• Rosa Maria Marta Caruso (Politecnico di Torino)
• Abdulrahman Gamil Mahmoud El-Taliawi (Politecnico di Torino)
• Leone Carlo Ghoddousi (Università di Roma Tre)
• Angelo Giuseppe Landi (Politecnico di Milano)
• Erica Lenticchia (Politecnico di Torino)
• Rossella Maspoli (Politecnico di Torino)
• Tanja Marzi (Politecnico di Torino)
• Francesco Novelli (Politecnico di Torino)
• Martino Pavignano (Politecnico di Torino)
• Monica Volinia (Politecnico di Torino)

Thematic Sessions (TS)Thematic Sessions (TS)

TS1. Demolition History: Practices of Architectural Dismantling in Europe

• Chairs: Armando Antista, Léonore Dubois-Losserand, Gaia Nuccio
• Description: Reconstructs the practices of demolition and architectural dismantling in Europe from Antiquity to the early modern period. It focuses on the circular economy of early building sites, driven by the recovery and reuse of materials

TS2. Masters and Knowledge in Late Gothic Mediterranean Civil Architecture

• Chairs: Emanuela Garofalo, Javier Ibañez Fernández, Marcello Schirru
• Description: Analyzes late Gothic civil architecture (15th-17th centuries) in the Mediterranean, exploring building techniques, materials, and specialized vocabularies. It highlights the interconnected operational landscape of craftsmen and professionals

TS3. Black Marbles in Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe

• Chairs: Caterina Cardamone, Pieter Martens.
• Description: Explores the trade, circulation, and perception of jet-black limestones ('black marbles') in historical architecture. It investigates their shift from symbolizing negative qualities to becoming a prestigious material for northern European sepulchres

TS4. The Early Modern Machine Model Book in Its Entirety

• Chairs: Elizabeth M. Merrill, Campus Boekentoren.
• Description: Examines early modern machine model books (1300-1700) as complete objects by integrating material, visual, and textual evidence. It addresses how these bound compendia functioned as crucial transmitters of applied mechanics and construction knowledge

TS5. History of Construction and Common Walls

• Chairs: Michela Barbot, Robert Carvais.
• Description: Investigates the material, financial, and legal complexities of shared party walls and joint ownership. It explores how engineers, architects, and lawyers historically negotiated and graphically represented these common boundaries

TS6. Words of the Building Site: Towards a Glossary of Early Modern Construction Vocabulary

• Chairs: Valentina Burgassi.
• Description: Presents the initial outcomes of the EUROGLOSS project, which aims to create a multilingual digital glossary of early modern technical construction vocabulary. It focuses on how language reflects materials, craft hierarchies, and knowledge transfer across European courts

TS7. Building Together: Collective Works and Collaborations in the "Worlds" of Construction, Eighteenth - Twentieth Century

• Chairs: Veronique Boone, Guy Lambert
• Description: Moves beyond single-author architectural histories to examine the practical conditions, tools, and shared cultures of collective work. It focuses on the evolving collaborative dynamics among architects, engineers, and contractors

TS8. The Role of Professional Associations of Engineers, Architects, and Industrialists in Promoting Construction Knowledge, Eighteenth - Twentieth Century

• Chairs: Antonio D'Andrea, Davide Luraschi, Carlo Rottenbacher, Mauro Volpiano
• Description: Analyzes how technical societies and associations acted as key mediators in shaping and internationalizing construction knowledge. It explores their role in establishing shared standards during periods of rapid industrialization

TS9. Craft, Capital, and Change: Stonemasons in the Nineteenth Century

• Chairs: Jennifer Alexander, Alexandrina Buchanan, Nina Baker
• Description: Examines the shifting world of stonemasons during a century marked by the rise of general contracting and mechanized stone-cutting. It explores the impacts on laborers' skills, mobility, training, and collective activism

TS10. Construction as Flow: Materials, Energy, Labour, and Capital in the Making of the Built Environment in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries

• Chairs: Stephanie Van de Voorde, Adam Przywara, Lara Reyniers, Ine Wouters
• Description: Proposes "flow" as an analytical framework, viewing buildings not as static objects, but as temporary condensations of materials, energy, labor, and capital. It asks how these elements were assembled and shaped by broader political economies

TS11. Material Movements

• Chairs: Martina Motta, Martino Lorenzo Fagnani
• Description: Challenges the perception of building materials as inert by tracking their trajectories from extraction to application. It unpacks the social, political, and ecological inequalities embedded within the supply chains of architectural production

TS12. Approaches to Film in Construction History: Methodologies and Critical Perspectives

• Chairs: João Mascarenhas-Mateus, Maria Grazia d'Amelio, Francisco Domouso d'Alba
• Description: Explores moving images—such as newsreels and documentaries—as crucial, underutilized sources for studying historical building cultures. It analyzes how film captures the deployment of machinery, labor organization, and professional practices

TS13. The Interchange Between Engineers, Construction Companies, Scientists, and Academic Institutions in the Development of Large-Scale Structures at the End of the Nineteenth Century

• Chair: Rolf Hoehmann
• Description: Investigates the transnational exchange of theories and techniques among engineers and institutions during the late 19th century. It uses the development of large bow arch bridges as a primary lens for understanding this international collaboration

TS14. Vertical Urbanism: A Pre-History

• Chair: Thomas Leslie
• Description: Reevaluates skyscraper history by moving beyond purely structural paradigms to include environmental design, finance, labor, and user experience. It welcomes studies on ancient, medieval, or industrial-era tall buildings to contextualize modern vertical urbanism

TS15. Construction Histories of Global Oil Infrastructures

• Chairs: Maryia Rusak, Giulia Scotto
• Description: Investigates how the rapid expansion of global oil infrastructures reshaped modern construction standards, materials, and logistics. It highlights oil companies as powerful actors driving prefabrication and engineering innovation

TS16. The Other of Concrete: Earth, Brick, Stone and Local Building Crafts in the Arab Region, 1900 - Present

• Chairs: Faiq Mari, Nadi Abusaada, Abdulrahman El-Taliawi
• Description: Explores how local building crafts (earth, brick, stone) in the Arab region interacted with, or resisted, the 20th-century hegemony of concrete. It positions these material transitions as reflections of the region's geopolitical and colonial histories

TS17. How Construction Shaped Globalisation: Current "Asia as Method" Approaches

• Chair: Shu Chang-Xue
• Description: Challenges the narrative of unidirectional Western technological diffusion by reconceptualizing Asian knowledge and materials as active agents in global construction. It views Asia-related construction activities as crucial laboratories of innovation

TS18. Rebuilding Methods and Construction Issues During and After the Second World War, 1937-1949

• Chairs: Zhenyu Zhu, Haiqing Li, Thomas Coomans
• Description: Focuses on the specific technical capabilities, policies, and methods adopted for efficient rebuilding during and directly after WWII. It examines these extreme conditions to highlight the resilience of populations and construction cultures

TS19. Beyond the Limits: Lightweight Large-Span Metal Roofs for the Postwar Industrial Development

• Chairs: Renato Morganti, Edoardo Currà, Matteo Abita.
• Description: Examines the postwar development of innovative, lightweight metal roofing systems (trusses, vaults, cable-stayed) designed for new industrial spaces. It explores the international circulation of these structural patents and the challenges of conserving them today

TS20. Twentieth Century Prototype Construction Systems: Between Technological Innovation and Construction Practice

• Chairs: Irene Matteini, Rosario Ceravolo, Stefania Landi.
• Description: Analyzes experimental prototype structural solutions developed between the 1900s and 1990s, from prefabricated panels to pneumatic structures. It addresses the fragmented documentation and complex conservation challenges these modern heritage systems present

TS21. Inside the Office: Sharing (or Not) Work, Expertise and Credit in Designing Buildings

• Chairs: Simon De Nys-Ketels, Rika Devos.
• Description: Disentangles the complex, collaborative nature of 19th- and 20th-century design offices, revealing the hidden labor of draftsmen, managers, and administrators. It interrogates the hierarchies, tools, and evolving division of tasks behind building projects

TS22. Early Computational Processes for Construction (1950s-1970s)

• Chairs: Giulia Boller, Andreas Kalpakci
• Description: Examines how the postwar building industry pioneered the use of mainframe computers for scheduling, structural calculation, and standardizing production. It historicizes the roots of today's AEC computational practices back to early engineering and research bodies

TS23. The Building Site in Reverse: Towards a History of Deconstruction

• Chairs: Alberto Bologna, Ilaria Giannetti, Gabriele Neri
• Description: Investigates the history of deconstruction, selective demolition, and "reassembly" projects from 1945 to 2000. It seeks to historically ground contemporary "cradle-to-cradle" practices and Design for Disassembly methodologies

TS24. Architecture and Public Works: An Environmental Risk Perspective

• Chairs: Dominique Massounie, Théodore Guuinic
• Description: Bridges construction and environmental history by examining how buildings and infrastructures adapted to long-term risks like floods, avalanches, and earthquakes. It explores the historical design logic of resilience and structural vulnerability

TS25. Building the Industrial Barn: A Construction and Zootechnical History

• Chair: Sofia Nannini
• Description: Explores the industrial barn as a technological laboratory where building techniques met zootechnical hygiene requirements. It traces how farms adopted advanced materials and mechanized systems to optimize livestock production since the 19th century

TS26. Where Are the Workers?

• Chairs: Sarah Nichols, Davide Spina
• Description: Addresses the marginalization of construction workers in historical narratives by foregrounding them as key agents of architectural change. It explores how workers' tacit knowledge, unionization, and strikes influenced structural innovations

TS27. Construction Technologies in Ukraine Across Centuries: Material Cultures, Structural Systems, and Technical Epistemologies for Post-War Reconstruction

• Chairs: Alessandra Tosone, Marianna Rotilio, Danilo Di Donato
• Description: Documents the long history of Ukrainian construction—from vernacular timber to Soviet prefabrication—to establish a rigorous framework for post-war reconstruction. It emphasizes how understanding historical structural logic is critical for assessing wartime damage

TS28. AI, VR and AR: Digital Horizons in Construction History

• Chairs: Paolo Stracchi, Luciano Cardellicchio, Gianluca Capurso
• Description: Evaluates the methodological shift brought by artificial intelligence, virtual reality, and augmented reality to construction history research. It explores how these tools enhance archival transcription, immersive structural reconstruction, and public dissemination

Open Sessions (OS)

(Note: Session Chairs are not assigned for Open Sessions in the Call for Abstracts, as these encompass broader, fundamental topics of the field)

OS1. Building actors: Focuses on the roles of contractors, architects, engineers, master builders, craftspeople, unions, and institutions.

OS2. Building Materials: Covers the history and use of timber, earth, brick, steel, concrete, glass, reclaimed materials, and more.

OS3. Construction Sites and Processes: Examines scaffoldings, lifting devices, temporary structures, transport, prefabrication, and site management logistics.

OS4. Building Services and Techniques: Details the evolution of lighting, heating, ventilation, comfort, hygiene, and water systems.

OS5. Infrastructure: Explores the construction history of railways, roads, airports, tunnels, bridges, harbors, dams, and water supply networks.

OS6. Structural Theory and Analysis: Discusses computing, simulation, material testing, and the relationship between applied science and practice.

OS7. Elements of Construction & Design: Focuses on preliminary designs, construction drawings, models, foundations, roofs, and finishing details.

OS8. Economics, Politics and Society: Analyzes laws, patents, standards, financing, marketing, and the politics of public works.

OS9. Construction Cultures: Explores traditions, craftsmanship, colonial history, hybridisation of cultures, and periods of innovation or crisis.

OS10. Knowledge and Knowledge Transfer: Investigates technical literature, education, scientific dissemination, and the role of fairs and exhibitions.

OS11. Challenges in Construction History: Addresses contemporary challenges like the environmental turn, digital histories, and Actor-Network Theory.

Venue

The conference will be held at Politecnico di Torino, Turin, Italy.

Contact

Stay informed and direct inquiries through the official conference website: https://constructionhistorygroup.polito.it/icch/ e-mail: chg@polito.it