(via) When Mount Vesuvius catastrophically erupted in 79 AD the nearby city of Pompeii (near Naples) and its satellite settlements and villas were completely wiped out. Over a thousand people were killed in the wake of the eruption, most buried some 15 feet deep in a blanket of hot, suffocating ash. The existence of Pompeii was the stuff of legend until it was rediscovered at the turn of the 16th century, some 1,500 years after the eruption. The ash has since been cleared away and the remains of Pompeii – including the tragic, frozen in time body casts of many of its tortured inhabitants – continue to attract millions of tourists every year.

What we haven’t been able to do, however, is see much beyond pitted stone and faded motif. The architecture can be guessed at in its totality, but the interiors, not so much. In recent years, however, Italian archaeologists thoroughly excavated and digitally scanned the remains of a particularly well preserved district of Pompeii, and researchers from Sweden’s University of Lund have been able to reconstruct one of its more lavish houses – belonging to a rich fellow named Caecilius Lucundus – right down to the colourful wall plaster. Bonus: they did it in 3D, so we can go for a look inside…