Restoration & Rehabilitation

Rehabilitation and restoration are terms that are very commonly connected with buildings. But these two terms are also used when talking about ecosystems, forests, and the like. It is quite normal that people go for rehabilitation and restoration of their homes once their buildings begin to decay or start to have damage.

First of all, let us talk about rehabilitation and restoration in connection with the ecosystem. In an ecosystem, “restoration” means the process of recovering an ecosystem that has been damaged, degraded, or destroyed maybe because of soil erosion or human interference. Restoration of an ecosystem is an attempt to return it to its historical trajectory. On the other hand, “rehabilitation” means the reparation of ecosystem processes, services, and productivity but it does not mean to restore the ecosystem to its pre-existing condition.

As it pertains to buildings, people may go for rehabilitation and restoration when they start to see structural damage or any structural decay. It should also be noted that restoration and rehabilitation have helped considerably in restoring the old glory of historical monuments. For example, the Parthenon of Greece, the Great Sphinx and Pyramids of Egypt, St. Mark’s Cathedral in Venice, the Coliseum of Rome, Alhambra in Granada, and the Great Wall of China have all undergone restoration and rehabilitation.

In architectural terms, “restoration” is a process or act of depicting the characters and features of a property as it appeared at a particular period. Rehabilitation of a building means returning a building or a structure to a useful state by means of repair, modification, or alteration.