The goal of the intervention, which was carried out in accord with international principles governing the restoration of monuments, was the structural restoration of the building and partial reconstruction of the destroyed faces of the burial chamber and antechamber. The former intervention was of a salvage nature and necessary to remedy the dilapidated state of the antechamber’s vault.

Planning for the structural restoration of the building obeyed the following basic principles: consolidation and protection in its present deformed state, respect for the monument’s original structural system, limitation of interventions to an absolute minimum. Interventions involving structural support were confined to places where the remaining load-bearing capacity proved inadequate, or where the type of damage threatened the construction’s stability. In studying the history of the monument—which started as a funeral structure before being successively converted into an archaeological find, abandoned ruin, and ultimately, a listed monument—it was evident that after ensuring its material integrity, it needed to be re-included in the historical process, assuming a new role compatible with its historical and artistic value.

It was our decision to open the monument to the public once again, as an exceptional example of the architecture of Macedonian tombs and a landmark in the Derveni cemetery. As a precondition for achieving this goal, it was necessary to partially restore the half-destroyed (in antiquity) form of the edifice, which, as was determined by study of the scattered material that came from it, could be reconstituted without any alteration to its authenticity. Within this context, it was considered necessary to reconstruct the partially-destroyed eastern wall of the antechamber, and primarily, to reconstruct the façade of the edifice. The theoretical approach to the intervention in both cases was the same, although implementation differed as regarded materials and extent of work. The methodology of intervention depended on the state of preservation of each wall, while in both cases structural support, where needed, involved new material.