New Insights into Everyday Heritage: Surface Analysis and Conservation

Dear Colleagues,

Everyday heritage is an “ordinary cultural carrier” that originates from the daily production and life practices of human beings and carries the cultural memory and identity of a specific group. It includes both tangible material remains and intangible practical wisdom. Its core characteristics are “daily” and “life-oriented”. Different from “iconic heritage”, with grand narrative attributes such as monuments and palaces, it is rooted in the daily life of ordinary people, such as their food, clothing, housing, transportation, work, and rest. It is the most vivid and lasting presentation of culture in trivial daily life. Everyday heritage can be divided into two dimensions: (1) Material everyday heritage: Physical objects and spaces directly related to daily needs, such as rural houses that carry the wisdom of regional life, traditional tools accompanying labor, utensils that record daily aesthetic and practical needs, and public spaces that constitute daily activity scenes. (2) Intangible daily life heritage: Practices, skills, and rituals embedded in daily processes, such as technical methods related to traditional production. However, due to its low “monumentality”, everyday heritage has long been marginalized in conservation discourse. Its fragile surfaces, such as peeling paint or coatings on vernacular architectural heritage or corroded metalware, are often overlooked during restoration. Intangible practices associated with these surfaces, such as the art of polishing pottery to a specific sheen or the techniques and rituals used in traditional households, are at risk of disappearing amidst rapid urbanization and digitization. Conventional conservation frameworks prioritize the “authenticity of grand architecture” over the “integrity of everyday life”, failing to address the unique challenges of preserving these mundane yet vital cultural expressions.

This Special Issue aims to rethink the conservation of everyday heritage through a critical perspective on “surface analysis and conservation”. We invite original research from interdisciplinary perspectives, including but not limited to cultural heritage studies, materials science, conservation science, cultural anthropology, and urban planning, to explore how surface characterization technologies influence the value of everyday heritage and how targeted conservation strategies can preserve its authenticity and vitality.

The scope of this Special Issue includes, but is not limited to, the following topics:

• Surface material analysis of everyday heritage artifacts;
• Conservation challenges of fragile surfaces;
• Intangible surface-related practices in conservation;
• Digital technologies for surface documentation and conservation;
• Mechanisms of surface corrosion on everyday heritage.

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Yile Chen
Dr. Liang Zheng
Guest Editors

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