Cologne Cathedral as a digital twin

 

Virtual journey through the digital twin of the cathedral impresses at the leading European trade fair “Denkmal”

For visitors to the last "Denkmal", the leading European trade fair for the preservation, restoration and renovation of historic buildings in Leipzig, it was an impressive première: the first digital twin of what is probably Germany's most famous cultural and historical building, Cologne Cathedral. Together with Dr Alexander Stenzer from AriInfoWare GmbH in Passau, Michael Jürkel, stone technician at Cologne Cathedral, presented the monumental building as a digital twin, which provides all available building information and detailed views in a huge point cloud and 2D plans, making it a virtual experience.

The digital twin of Cologne Cathedral - depicted in the MonArch information system

Comprehensive digital building documentation of Cologne Cathedral

MonArch is the name of the spatial information system in which several hundred gigabytes of data have been compiled over the past two years of co-operation between AriInfoWare GmbH and Dombauhütte Köln. And this is just the beginning of the comprehensive digital documentation of the cathedral building, which was completed in 1880 - and the basis for effective building management.

The construction period of Cologne Cathedral alone, from the laying of the foundation stone in 1248 to its completion, lasted more than 600 years. But what does completion mean? An old Cologne saying goes: "When Cologne Cathedral is finished, the world will come to an end": Something and somewhere is always being built at Cologne Cathedral. The wealth of information that has accumulated over the centuries and continues to accumulate is almost unmanageable. And that is precisely the great challenge with many cultural-historical buildings.

"Access to information about a building is often difficult, even if it is available in digital form," says Dr Alexander Stenzer, Managing Director of AriInfoWare GmbH. "It cannot be found because it has been archived in different places or the knowledge about the storage of the information has not been passed on. This situation leads to a loss of knowledge, which inevitably leads to problems and increased costs in the preservation of monuments".

Linking all digital information at a central location

The Kölner Dombauhütte Kölner Dom, which is responsible for the preservation of the World Heritage Site, has been effectively driving forward the digital transformation of Cologne Cathedral for years.

Michael Jürkel: "Knowledge of the structural condition and information about past repairs and restorations are essential for the preservation of Cologne Cathedral. The cooperation with AriInfoWare GmbH and the use of their MonArch information system offers the solution for linking and utilising all information relating to the monument at a central location."

The digital twin is always up to date

The MonArch system enables the precise and detailed recording of every element, be it a single wall, a room or even a specific building block, and interactive navigation through the information inventory via graphical models such as point clouds, 3D models or 2D plans. It no longer matters where the data is physically stored - locally or on a MonArch server. The hierarchical building structure guarantees fast and intuitive access to all information relevant to a component, even with large and complex databases.

Thanks to an advanced combination of relational database and graph technology, MonArch not only offers excellent data networking, but also smooth collaboration in multi-user operation.

All project participants, e.g. during renovation work, can access the information, plan work processes together and document the construction progress directly in the MonArch system. Using multidimensional keywords from individually created or imported vocabularies, materials, damage, restoration measures or historical classifications can be easily stored and give the data status an additional semantic dimension.

MonArch offers simple data entry and intuitive search for information

Research approach: Digitisation of monumental archive holdings

The MonArch information system is the result of 20 years of research by the Institute for Information Systems and Software Technology at the University of Passau. Together with various cooperation partners, the idea was pursued to enable the digitisation of monumental archive holdings using software. The objective: to modernise and simplify the preservation of cultural heritage. After the retirement of the responsible professor - Prof Dr Burkhard Freitag - his team at the chair wanted to continue pursuing this goal in the future and therefore founded AriInfoWare GmbH in 2021. Since then, the MonArch team has developed the ability to virtually map the entire life cycle of a construction project and to record and manage all relevant information - from initial planning to restoration and ongoing maintenance - in a centralised and networked manner. The digital twin of a building serves as a central, universal information repository throughout its entire life cycle - for both cultural and modern buildings.

The MonArch information system is currently being used in a number of cultural history projects, including the Imperial Baths in Trier, the Weißenhofsiedlung in Stuttgart, Aachen Town Hall and some of Germany's most famous cathedrals - Bamberg, Brandenburg, Regensburg and Cologne.

Forward-looking solution for the transformation of centuries-old building culture into the digital age

Dr Alexander Stenzer: "The close cooperation between IT and monument science makes it easier for the MonArch team to understand the requirements and special features of cultural-historical buildings and to implement them in digital solutions. The collection and networking of digital building data only makes sense if it can be used in a practice-orientated way by all project participants, even without IT knowledge. We support our project partners in analysing, entering and maintaining the data and provide them with ongoing support in the form of workshops and seminars. The many years of collaboration with MonArch users and the increasing demand show that we have developed a forward-looking solution for the transformation of centuries-old building culture into the digital age."

A solution that goes beyond pure building documentation by integrating 2D plans, 3D models, point clouds and map views to offer impressive and exciting views, as the presentation of the digital Cologne Cathedral at the "Denkmal" trade fair proves.

Cologne Cathedral can be experienced virtually as a digital twin at the "Denkmal" trade fair