Italy

Architect (IUAV) PhD in Conservation of Architectural Heritage (Milan Polytechnic), he was for a long time an official architect at the ABAP Superintendency for the Municipality of Venice and its Lagoon, where he took on various coordination roles, such as that for the UNESCO site “Venice and its Lagoon” and was in charge of the restoration of important public buildings in Venice like Marciana National Library, Gallerie dell’Accademia, the Jesuit Church and the bell towers of Venice.

Since 2021 he has been RTD B researcher at IUAV in Venice and now he is assistant professor in Architectural Restoration. He carries out teaching activities at IUAV and at the Cà Foscari University of Venice. He carries out study and research activities on historical buildings in Venice, Cultural Heritage and climate change. He has participated in international conferences and is the author of several scientific publications. He sits on numerous scientific committees of journals and is a member of associations dealing with Cultural Heritage, such as Green Building Council Italia and ICOMOS Italia.

Gaianè Casnati is a conservator architect, Director of the Cultural Heritage department of the Centro Studi e Documentazione della Cultura Armena (CSDCA) and Research Fellow in Architectural conservation at Politecnico di Milano. Casnati is the author of several preservation projects in Italy and abroad (i.e. the preservation of the Roman amphitheatre of Milan, the safeguarding of the entrance tower of Shayzar castle in Syria, the structural repair of the katoghiké church of Marmashen in Armenia) and is editor/author of a number of publications on Armenian heritage conservation (several articles and 3 books). She has organised three exhibits on Armenian themes (that travelled in Armenia and in Europe) and has spoken at international congresses (in Italy, Armenia, France, Belgium, Austria, etc.). She has been working for CSDCA and Politecnico di Milano on projects in Armenia for organisations such as UNESCO, the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Europa Nostra and the World Bank.
She has been a project manager for the project Restoration Training in Armenia, awarded by Europa Nostra in 2015 in the category Education, Training and Awareness Raising. She is a member of the Advisory Board of the 7 Most Endangered programme of Europa Nostra.