Expertise at the service of Historical Buildings
A primordial mission : Technical and Scientific Control
In the matter of government-owned historical buildings, the LRMH is allowed to perform almost every scientific interventions along the process of restoration and conservation until its ending. But it may also call upon external laboratories for analyses that can not be performed why its equipments. This domain is the main field of action of the LRMH and its first public service type of mission.
In the matter of historical buildings – public or private – that does not belong to the government, the LRMH takes action as part of the State Technical and Scientific Control. The LRMH gives access to its archives about the historical building, can participate to a pre-diagnosis and suggests scientific and technical studies protocols that can be used as a fondation in order to consult private laboratories (whose results may be assessed by the LRMH). This domain is the second main field of action of the LRMH.
Whoever is the buyer, the LRMH offers a free service, its operations being financed by the cultural ministry.
On the field
In order to answer questions, scientists from the LRMH perform numerous missions on the field : near to 180 every year, as well in France as in other countries. Some missions do not imply a new intervention afterwards but some others do and the actions of the laboratory therefore become a follow-up system.
It is the case for several scientific departments as the Ornated Caves department which organise rounds every year in order to inspect the evolution of rupestrian monuments across french regions like Occitanie, Nouvelle-Aquitaine or PACA. Other scientific departments may have the same organization : the Stone department for the cairn of Gavrinis in Brittany or the cathedral of Amiens, or the Concrete departement for the palace of Iena in Paris.The scientific departments advise sometines to do some monitoring on special historical buildings, which means placing lasting instrumentation that can gather data. It is the case in the villa E1027 in Roquebrune-Cap-Martin.