Stone masonry buildings: Analysis of structural acoustic and energy performance within the seismic safety criteria Alessandro Schiavi a,⇑ , Gianfranco Cellai b , Simone Secchi c , Fabio Brocchi b , Alessandro Grazzini d , Andrea Prato a , Fabrizio Mazzoleni a a INRiM – National Institute of Metrological Research, Applied Metrology and Engineering Division, Torino, Italy b Department of Industrial Engineering, University of Florence, Firenze, Italy c Department of Architecture, University of Florence, Firenze, Italy d Department of Structural, Geotechnical and Building Engineering, Politecnico di Torino, Italy highlights  Development, technological innovations and building physics of natural stone masonry.  Sustainable renovation of stone buildings, preservation of original local landscape.  Survey on the recent legislative/technical framework of Italian building technology.  Analysis of structure-borne and air-borne sound insulation of building elements.  Evaluation of energy performance, reduction of energy consumption, thermal comfort. article info Article history: Received 1 February 2019 Received in revised form 20 April 2019 Accepted 30 May 2019 abstract Natural stone masonry is a building technology largely used all over the world, since the dawn of human- kind. At present day stone masonry buildings, beyond being naturally characterized by intrinsic building physics performances, allow to reconsider the use of natural stone masonry (together with new techno- logical supports, components and materials), as a promising ‘‘new trend” for both newly developed build- ings and renovation of existing buildings, in particular where it is a priority to retrieve the historical identity of the urban landscape. In this paper, energy performance and structural-acoustic properties of stone masonry buildings, in compliance with seismic safety criteria, are investigated and discussed on the basis of current technical standards and scientific literature. Related performances are evaluated by means of accurate calculation models. The results show that stone masonry buildings can offer often higher performance than those normally attributed to it. Ó 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction The use of natural stone material for buildings is coeval with the development of the human societies. As it is commonly known, the evidences of this building technology, from the Neolithic era up to the present day, are widespread all over the world. Furthermore, many stone buildings and historical centers of great historical, cul- tural and architectural relevance are listed among the UNESCO World Heritage sites [1]. As a consequence, restoration, renovation and safety technologies (in particular in seismic risk areas) of mon- umental and historical masonry stone buildings are fundamental requirements for the preservation of cultural heritages. Many methodologies and technical procedures have been stud- ied and applied for the preservation of stone masonry buildings [2– 5]. Recent proposals of recovery or reconstruction, also supported by laws and regulations, aim to preserve both the historical build- ings and its local landscape, by using (or re-using) the same build- ing materials [6]. On the basis of this cultural perspective, with reference to Italy, in which historical and monumental stone masonry buildings are widespread on high seismic risk areas, MiBAC (Ministry of Cultural Heritage) recognizes the value of ordinary historical buildings as monumental buildings, by considering ancient villages and even minor historical towns, as cultural heritages as a whole. Natural stone masonry is thus a priority resource for buildings reconstruc- tion or renovation in areas recently devastated by seismic events, in order to recover the historical-typological identity of Central https://doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2019.05.192 0950-0618/Ó 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. ⇑ Corresponding author. E-mail address: a.schiavi@inrim.it (A. Schiavi). Construction and Building Materials 220 (2019) 29–42 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Construction and Building Materials journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/conbuildmat