Over the past fifteen years, the supply of housing for university students has increased significantly, favoured by a greater attention paid by national institutions to the issue of student housing; in Italy, however, only about 4% of students live in university residences. From 2001 until now, interventions on existing buildings have accounted for about 60% of the overall measures proposed for new university residences, accounting for most of the available public economic resources. The possibility of recovering and re-using existing buildings for university residences is interesting for the city of Catania, as most of the students are enrolled in university courses located within the historic city centre; moreover, abandoned buildings are currently a significant part of the architectural heritage of the city. The aim of this research is to develop an articulated and integrated set of framework to support the various phases of the design process, for the recovery of existing buildings and their re-use as university residences. The approach proposed applies the existing dimensional standards and environmental sustainability principles to a building constructed using traditional techniques.