The design of the Politecnico di Torino “Campus delle Architetture, del Design e della Pianificazione” has an enormous strategic value, both for the reorganisation of the University and for the city dynamics, contributing to the overall development of the Po cultural axis. The transformation involved by the new campus will significantly impact the life of the area, radically changing its intensity through the daily flows of thousands of people and making the park an actual natural connective tissue. The communication project includes the realisation of events aimed at presenting the Campus to disseminate and popularise the outcomes of the realisation process to different stakeholders, showing a scale model of the area. Among the innovative features of the communication proposal is the superimposition of digital layers on the physical model for audience engagement through a webAR that activates a step-by-step journey with descriptions of different aspects of the campus project.
Extended Reality for Museums and Exhibit Design: Experiences in Didactic Activities
The paper illustrates the didactic activity of the introductory seminar Inside the Museum, held since 2021 for the master’s degree courses of the Department of Architecture and Design (DAD) at the Politecnico di Torino. The paper describes the innovative character undertaken during the seminar and how it has evolved in parallel with the digital transition that has affected education and cultural heritage. The central theme of the seminar is the relationship between digital technologies and museum institutions, which was investigated according to a multidisciplinary approach involving the disciplines of drawing and representation, together with the themes of exhibit design and museography addressed through Extended Reality as the communicative medium of the project design. The main applications used for the teaching activity were web-based tools for creating virtual, immersive, and augmented reality experiences. Video storytelling, a passive entertainment-oriented product, 360° virtual tours allowing interactive enjoyment, and HeritageMaps, used for developing interactive maps with georeferenced content, were addressed. Starting from low-cost and sustainable web-based solutions, the latest activities experimented with the customization of AR applications using Unity and Vuforia Engine tools.
AR Applied to the Tactile Models. Museo di Arte Orientale in Turin: Communicating the Vaulted System of Palazzo Mazzonis
In recent decades, museums, as fundamental cultural institutions of modern society, have increasingly explored innovative methods and tools for the communication and dissemination of knowledge. This process has led to significant changes in their approaches to visitor engagement. One of the most common strategies for creating interactive content in the museum field is the use of extended reality (XR) technologies and direct haptic experiences that support storytelling and interaction. By combining virtual and real environments, XR can stimulate multiple senses through the addition of digital inputs, thereby expanding the channels of knowledge transmission.
In the museum sector, however, there is still a lack of widespread and shared awareness regarding how virtual and real content should interact and how the most effective experiences for cultural transmission should be designed. The presented case study focuses on the vaulted system of the atrium of Palazzo Mazzonis in Turin, the seat of the Museum of Oriental Art, where a structured and well-tested methodology of geometric decomposition and digital reconstruction has been applied.
Augmented Reality (AR) and a digitally fabricated 3D model have been used to communicate the results of this study to a broad audience, serving different purposes ranging from research and dissemination to tourism and recreational activities.
Design and Modeling Atelier: Interaction of Physical and Virtual Models for Augmented Design Experiences
This paper presents an educational experiment aimed at integrating physical and digital modeling within architectural design processes through augmented reality workflows. The research investigates how the interaction between tangible maquettes, digital 3D models, and AR visualization can enhance design understanding, communication, and learning outcomes in an academic context.
The methodology is developed within a design atelier where students produce multi-scale physical models (1:500 and 1:200), digital models using NURBS-based software, and AR applications that overlay virtual content onto real maquettes. The workflow combines traditional fabrication techniques, digital modeling tools, and AR platforms such as Sketchfab, MyWebAR, and Vuforia, enabling the superimposition of additional information, animations, and design alternatives onto physical models. As shown in the workflow diagram (Fig. 2, p. 594), the process integrates sequential phases from urban maquette construction to AR visualization. Results demonstrate that hybrid real–virtual environments improve spatial comprehension, support iterative design processes, and foster a more effective communication of architectural concepts, while also highlighting technical challenges related to model alignment, tracking, and interoperability.
Augmented Reality and Avatars for Museum Heritage Storytelling
This paper presents an augmented reality storytelling system designed to enhance museum accessibility, interpretation, and visitor engagement through the use of animated avatars and 3D reconstructions. Developed by a multidisciplinary team at Politecnico di Torino, the project focuses on three sculptures from the Museum of Oriental Art (MAO) in Turin that illustrate the evolution of Buddha iconography in the Mathura region of northern India. The workflow combines photogrammetric survey, philological reconstruction of missing parts, lightweight 3D modelling, avatar animation, and mobile AR deployment through Unity, Vuforia, and ARCore. A virtual human guide accompanies visitors through the exhibition space, narrating historical content, indicating directions, and explaining stylistic transformations and hypothetical restorations. Reconstructed additions are visually differentiated from the originals to ensure scientific transparency. The study demonstrates how AR and virtual guides can transform traditional museum visits into immersive and inclusive learning experiences, improving communication for audiences of different ages, cultures, and educational backgrounds.
Promotion of the Museum of Oriental Art in Turin by AR and Digital Fabrication: Lady Yang
A fundamental aspect of visiting museums is the involvement of visitors to facilitate the understanding of the collections on display [Black 2005, p. 7]: museums must therefore adopt techniques derived from the fields of relational and experiential marketing to improve the services offered.This contribution focuses on an ongoing experience, conducted at the Museum of Oriental Art in Turin (MAO), which involves the use of augmented reality (AR) combined with digital fabrication, applied in the field of cultural accessibility and marketing.In June 2021 the museum chose Lady Yang as artwork/mascot that would symbolically accompany the users in the visit path. It was decided to make this accompaniment tangible through digitally fabricated objects (a bookmark and a tactile replica) and an AR experience.The contribution wants to show the research workflow, from the digital acquisition of the artwork up to AR experience and digital fabrication, in a continuous transition between real and virtual, to demonstrate how they are mutually enriching in the visiting experience and process of knowledge.
VR, AR and Tactile Replicas for Accessible Museums. The Museum of Oriental Art in Turin
This work is part of the agreement stipulated between the Department of Architecture and Design of the Politecnico di Torino and the Fondazione Torino Musei for the enhancement of the cultural heritage of the Museum of Oriental Art (MAO). The agreement aims at the realization of accessible exhibition paths including multi-sensorial experiences in situ (tactile paths and AR experiences) and online (VR proposals) in the MAO. Specifically, six stages of this path have been identified, including the museum’s entrance hall and five artworks (one for each geographical area of the collection) which are the subject of the survey and restitution process. This involves thesis students of the Design and Visual Communication course of Politecnico di Torino for the development of prototype apps on the selected works and one of the authors for digital fabricated models and replica.
AI+AR: Cultural Heritage, Museum Institutions, Plastic Models and Prototyping. A State of Art
The links between representation and artificial intelligence (AI) invade many fields of architectural re-search, recording continuous and significant advances: they require, on the one hand, a constant update of the state of the art and, on the other hand, careful consideration of the role of Representation in interdisciplinary research in this field. The present contribution intends to investigate these intertwining in some of the most frequented research fields in recent years: the valorization and communication of Cultural Heritage and cultural tourism, the experiences in the museum field, the research on the role of the prototype within the processes of artificial intelligence applied to architecture.