Traditional crafts exhibit tangible and intangible dimensions. Intangible dimensions include the practitioner’s gestural know-how in craft practice and have received smaller attention than tangible dimensions in digitization projects. This work presents the process of representation and presentation of the glasswork and is exemplified in the re-creation of a historical object. Following an articulated pipeline approach for data collection, annotation, the crafting process is represented visually and semantically in a way that can be meaningfully presented and utilized in craft training and preservation. The outcomes of the proposed approach were used to implement a Mixed Reality installation. The installation targets craft presentation through an exploration of the workspace, as well as craft training through an interactive experience where users re-enact gestures of a glass master holding a tool and receiving audiovisual feedback on the accuracy of their performance. Preliminary evaluation results show high acceptance of the installation and increased user interest.

A protocol for the representation of traditional crafts and the tools to implement this are proposed. The proposed protocol is a method for the systematic collection and organization of digital assets and knowledge, their representation into a formal model, and their utilization for research, education, and preservation. A set of digital tools accompanies this protocol that enables the online curation of craft representations. The proposed approach was elaborated and evaluated with craft practitioners in three case studies. Lessons learned are shared and an outlook for future work is provided.

An approach to the representation and presentation of spatial and geographical context of cultural heritage sites is proposed. The goal is to combine semantic representations of social and historical context with 3D representations of cultural heritage sites acquired through 3D reconstruction and 3D modeling technologies, to support their interpretation and presentation in education and tourism. Several use cases support and demonstrate the application of the proposed approach including immersive craft and context demonstration environment and interactive games.

Chromotope, the 19th Century Chromatic Turn, is a multidisciplinary ERC research programme that focuses on the “chromatic turn” of the 1860s in France and England, following the invention of the first synthetic dyes. This project, based on a partnership between Sorbonne University (PI: Charlotte Ribeyrol), Oxford University, and the Conservatoire national des arts et métiers (Cnam), investigates how this turn led to new ways of thinking about colour in art, literature, history, and science throughout the second half of the 19th century. One of the key aims of this research is to reappraise the role played by the Cnam in the dissemination of knowledge about synthetic dyes, from the creation in 1852 of the first chair in dyeing and printing until the Interwar period, when a collection of dyes including more than 2500 references, obtained from major European firms, was formed. A full inventory based on the description of each container has just been made together with a bibliographical research. Nevertheless, 2% of the containers are unlabeled and the reattribution of their composition is the main goal of our study. In order to set an appropriate analysis protocol to identify these orphan containers, a preliminary work was conducted on a random selection of identified dyes. For this purpose, electrospray ionization mass spectrometry and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy were used on 13 samples from different dye classes. The relevance of this protocol will be discussed for the identification of unknown compounds.