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Historic Preservation

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Twenty-five years after the Rwandan genocide, memorials remember the 800,000 who died
piles of soiled clothing and sheets on church pews and floor

In this church in Nyamata, in Rwanda, bullet holes cover the ceiling and soiled clothing cover the pews and the floor, all reminders of the genocide that took place in the country 25 years ago. Randall Mason of the Stuart Weitzman School of Design has been working in that country for the past three years to conserve memorials dedicated to remembering the 800,000 people who died and to support Rwandans in their quest to do the same. (Photo: Randall Mason)

Twenty-five years after the Rwandan genocide, memorials remember the 800,000 who died

Penn historic preservation professor Randall Mason has been working with the country’s government since 2016 to protect and conserve such monuments.

Michele W. Berger

PennPraxis launches toolkit for neighborhood preservation
booklet questionnaire about a home's history

(Photo courtesy: PennDesign News)

PennPraxis launches toolkit for neighborhood preservation

In the past decade, Philadelphia’s building boom has been accompanied by a string of demolitions touching almost every corner of the city, and resulting in the loss of everything from iconic churches to vernacular row houses. But even as a growing number of Philadelphians lament these losses, advocates for historic preservation have sometimes struggled to make a case for keeping Philadelphia’s built fabric intact.

Penn Today Staff

Iconic preservation: A plan for the O’Keeffe home and studio
Exterior of Abiquiu House in sunlight

Georgia O’Keeffe’s Abiquiu House, Exterior, 2007. Herbert Lotz. © Georgia O’Keeffe Museum [RC.2009.002.067]. (Photo courtesy: PennDesign)

Iconic preservation: A plan for the O’Keeffe home and studio

A balance of science and critical thinking, plus reverence for the artist’s work and devotion to her space, makes the conservation assessment by a PennDesign team especially meaningful.

Penn Today Staff

State Department awards Penn $2 million to preserve cultural heritage in northern Iraq
A brown brick building in the background with gravestones and bushes in the foreground.

The cemetery of the Church of St. Thomas (above) in Mosul, Iraq, was badly damaged by Islamic State militants. The new grant awarded to the University of Pennsylvania will go toward stabilization and conservation of such culturally important sites.

State Department awards Penn $2 million to preserve cultural heritage in northern Iraq

The two-phase, three-year project aims to revitalize the city and its culture.
PennDesign preservationists complete digital documentation of PA.’s slatelands
Matero_Hinchman

John Hinchman and Frank Matero (Photo courtesy of PennDesign)

PennDesign preservationists complete digital documentation of PA.’s slatelands

Frank Matero and John Hinchman’s website detailing the industrial landscape of the Pennsylvania Slate Belt, a 22-square-mile expanse of quarries, towns, transportation networks, and industrial wreckage, serves as a historical preservation tool via digital humanities.

Penn Today Staff

Preserving Philadelphia’s Society Hill
Penn School of Design professor Francesca Ammon

Francesca Russello Ammon, a PennDesign assistant professor of city and regional planning, focused on Philadelphia's Society Hill neighborhood for her research on historic preservation. (Photo by Eric Sucar, University of Pennsylvania Communications)

Preserving Philadelphia’s Society Hill

The histories of more than 1,500 properties in a storied Philadelphia neighborhood are now accessible on the new website, “Preserving Society Hill.” Working with digital-humanities specialists in the Price Lab and the Libraries, PennDesign’s Francesca Ammon created an interactive map to document this innovative case study in urban renewal.