Encoding identity values in digital heritage workflows: lessons from Saxon rural architecture in Transylvania

Digital heritage workflows increasingly document buildings through surveys, models, and visualizations, but often remain weak in representing the identity values embedded in vernacular architecture. This Perspective argues for a value-based framework that links documentation, interpretation, and design through the concept of transmissible identity values. Using Saxon rural architecture in Transylvania as an illustrative case, it proposes transferable categories for internationally comparable heritage-building workflows.