The Multidimensional Evaluation of Cultural Heritage Regeneration Projects: A Proposal for Integrating Level(s) Tool—The Case Study of Villa Vannucchi in San Giorgio a Cremano (Italy)

The challenges of sustainable development are mainly concentrated in the cities. Therefore, they represent a key place for implementing strategies and actions to achieve (or not achieve) sustainable development objectives. In this perspective, the circular city model represents a new way of organizing the city. As demonstrated by a variety of best practices, the entry points for triggering circular processes at the urban scale are various. In this paper, cultural heritage is presented as the entry point for the implementation of this new urban development model. The focus here is on the implementation tools, with a particular emphasis on the evaluation tools for assessing the effectiveness and efficiency of this model, that is, the multidimensional benefits that it can produce. The Level(s) tool, proposed by the European Commission in 2017, is the only officially recognised assessment tool related to the circular economy at the European level. It aims to evaluate the performance of new buildings from a circular economy perspective. This paper intends to expand the field of action of the aforementioned tool to projects related to cultural heritage. Nevertheless, the Level(s) tool has some weaknesses in relation to values and attributes that need to be considered when dealing with cultural heritage. This paper proposes an evaluation framework for assessing cultural heritage renovation and reuse projects, considering all its values and the multidimensional impacts that they are able to produce (economic, social, environmental impacts) in the city. The starting point for the development of the proposed evaluation framework is the Level(s) tool by the European Commission. On the basis of critical considerations, this tool is integrated with criteria and indicators deduced from other previous studies and other official tools on this issue (Green Building Council and Heritage Impact Assessment tools). The evaluation framework is here tested to evaluate the renovation/reuse project of Villa Vannucchi, a historic building located in the city of San Giorgio a Cremano in the metropolitan city of Naples (Italy).