The New Auditorium of the Castle in l’Aquila, designed by Architect Renzo Piano, financed by the Province of Trento, temporarily relieves the Concert Hall of the 16th century Spanish fort, unfitted for use by the earthquake of April 6, 2009. The new hall is an oblique cube with 18m-long edges.The principles upon which the overall design is based are seismic action drop and building mass reduction. The choice of using wood comes from both architectural and structural reasons. Wood is a lightweight but very strong material. Little mass reduces the danger in case of earthquake. The Hall has a limited dissipative behaviour, because of its shape and of the chosen structural technology. There- fore we have adopted a base isolation system, composed by sixteen elastomeric isolators that reduce the seismic force by about 80%. The two additional buildings are used by the audience and the orchestra and are designed with the standard cross- lam panels building method, as an example of the application of lightweight and innovative earthquake-resistant techniques that can be used for the safe reconstruction of the Town too.
