Valoración de la arquitectura de tierra en Cuenca, Ecuador como herramienta para su conservación.

For the recovery of land-based heritage in rural and urban contexts, it is increasingly important to try to understand the entrepreneurship reasons, which involves effort and money in doing so. The campaign of maintenance of the neighborhood of the blacksmiths (Las Herrerías street) in the city of Cuenca has become a special opportunity to venture into the heritage values of its buildings that today are part of the world cultural heritage. This article describes the implemented process, to identify the heritage values ​​of the buildings of this popular neighborhood of Cuenca, a process that is framed in the purpose of defining the most timely and relevant maintenance actions to be performed. It is important to visualize the valorization as part of the land-based heritage conservation process. The study starts from a historical understanding of the role of the neighborhood in the city, of systematic approaches to its urban dimension, past and present, to the relationship with public space, the semi-private spaces of the architecture (transition portals) and the life patterns of the inhabitants in their homes. Valorization matrices (Nara matrices) are applied as tools for the identification of values ​​and the development of monographs for the neighborhood, sectors and individually (for each house) which allows to improve in a singular and general understanding of the heritage values ​​that have managed to identify intrinsic values ​​to each of the buildings and also values ​​that compromise and sustain their conservation by being part of an urban space (the neighborhood) that gives sense and reason for each building individually. The result of this exercise contributes to a sustained and solvent decision-making action for the maintenance activities framed in the Campaign of the Herrerías in Cuenca.