Beginning in 1996 the restorations of the exterior peristasis of the Temple of Mars Ultor have provided important information on the surface coloring of the Luna marble and on the construction technique of the building. In 1996 – 97 the architectural elements of the Hall of the Colossus were restored; the original marble pavement and the podium of the colossal statue had been reconstructed on site in the 1930’s. . Finally in 1999 the inside of the perimeter wall of the Temple and the northern part of the Forum (in pietra gabina and red Grottaoscura tufa) were restored, surveyed and photographed. The polychrome pavement was also restored in the cella of the Temple against the apse.
The pre-cataloguing of the materials, the widespread restorations, and the new graphic documentation undertaken systematically in the course of the planning of the Museum of the Imperial Fora, along with the results of the recent excavations, are the basis for a complete reexamination of the structure and decoration of the buildings of the Augustan Forum. The exhibition on The Colored Marbles of Imperial Rome gave rise to a reexamination of the use of colored marbles and of the coloring of white marble. A first prototype of recomposition for the Museum, relating to the attic story of the portico, was carried out on the occasion of the Berlin exhibition “Die Antike Klassik” in 2002. The studies were aimed at the architectural orders of the facade of the portico, the passageway between the porticoes and exedrae, the sculpture and statuary groups that decorated the porticoes, the niches and the free bases, and the decorated cornices on the walls. In the Hall of the Colossus the painted decoration on the back wall was recomposed, and the fragments of the colossal statue were reexamined. Finally, the decoration on the interior of the temple cella, including the celebrated Pegasus capital, is being reexamined.