Historic Preservation
Iconic Art Nouveau house Villa Majorelle will soon reopen for tours
France’s Villa Majorelle, which just wrapped up a key phase of interior restoration, is a gorgeous example of the ornate style.
Historic Brutalist building by Marcel Breuer will be transformed into a hotel
The long vacant building, last owned by Ikea, recently sold for $1.2 million.
25 endangered cultural sites added to 2020 World Monuments Watch list
The World Monument Fund has flagged 25 monuments, buildings, and communities worldwide that "marry great historical significance with contemporary social impact."
These 20 places rich in women’s history are competing for $2M in preservation grants
The public can cast up to five votes per day until October 29 and the historic sites with the most votes at the end will receive a share of $2 million in grants.
Voices of Alabama illuminates civil rights history sites with storytelling
As civil rights tourism booms, a new oral history project seeks to spotlight the importance of lesser-known civil rights history sites across Alabama.
The Miller House: blue-chip midcentury modernism in America’s heartland
Industrialist and architecture patron J. Irwin Miller commissioned a trio of designers—Eero Saarinen, Alexander Girard, and Dan Kiley—for his home in Indiana. It’s since been cemented in the canon as a masterpiece of midcentury residential design.
State Farm’s Art Deco former headquarters at risk of demolition
The Art Deco building, which served as the insurance giant’s headquarters from 1929 to 1972, is facing the wrecking ball after the sale of the building fell through.
Online database chronicles forgotten 20th-century buildings and monuments
Nonument documents the monuments, buildings, and infrastructure lost to time.
England adds a High Tech supermarket to its National Heritage List
England’s registry of historically significant places, is adding its first supermarket to its roster—a sprawling Sainsbury store in Camden’s Grand Union Complex.
The Getty Foundation grants $1.6 million to preserving modernist gems
This year’s winners include two U.S. works by Eero Saarinen, a Mozambique rail station, and a Soviet-era monument.
You can help save Nina Simone’s childhood home
A group of artists is working with the National Trust to raise money to restore the iconic singer’s first home.
A House is a machine for memory: Restoring Eileen Gray’s E.1027
The oral history of the legendary modernist building, its reopening, and the controversy that remains to this day
Portland Building on track to be delisted from National Register of Historic Places
The postmodern icon has apparently lost so much of its old self that it’s on track to be stripped of its national historic landmark status.
Will this PoMo wonderland in San Diego be saved?
Horton Plaza was designed to revive a dying downtown. Now it’s set to be destroyed.
National Trust’s list of 11 Most Endangered Places includes Music Row, National Mall
‘America’s Front Yard,’ musical landmarks, and a postmodern marvel are all at risk.
Why laser scans and digital backups are the future of landmark preservation
New technologies will make it easier to restore heritage sites like Notre Dame.
Can Notre Dame be rebuilt with 3D printing?
A Dutch company explores how to 3D-print the cathedral’s gargoyles from crumbled limestone and ash.
Docomomo announces winners of 2019 Modernism in America Awards
The new crop of winners cuts across buildings, interiors, and neighborhoods, which shows the breadth of preservation efforts in the country.
Notre Dame fire cause may have been electrical
Investigators are closer to discovering the cause of the devastating fire that damaged Paris’s Notre Dame Cathedral this week.
Notre Dame fire: How do you restore an architectural masterpiece?
Experts discuss what comes next in the rebirth and rebuilding of the cathedral.
Venturi Scott Brown-designed Abrams House faces demolition
The postmodern house, recently denied historic status by the Pittsburgh City Council, is now threatened by new owners’ demolition plans.
London’s famed Brutalist parking garage to be demolished
Welbeck Car Park is the next Brutalist gem to go.
Iconic modernist guest house by Paul Rudolph will hit the market soon
The Walker Guest House, in Florida, was a breakthrough for the architect.
8 Frank Lloyd Wright buildings nominated to be World Heritage Sites
Among the buildings nominated are the Hollyhock House in LA, the Guggenheim in New York City, and, of course, Fallingwater.
Want a piece of the Eiffel Tower? That’ll cost you $45K
On November 27, Paris auction house Artcurial is selling a 24-step chunk of the tower’s original staircase.
Landscape preservation’s urgent challenge: Civil rights historic sites
If the U.S. can’t preserve sites where it fought for its rights, what does that say about maintaining the rights themselves?
Rare Paul Revere Williams home in Iowa seeking historic protection
The architect’s California cool found its way to Cedar Rapids
You can now tour Le Corbusier’s Paris apartment and studio
After two years of renovation, the Paris apartment where Le Corbusier lived and worked from 1934 to 1965 is now ready for the public to visit.
Confronting slavery head-on, new museums shift how U.S. history is told
Americans are questioning "who we are as individuals, a region, a country."
How Sears Kit Homes changed housing
These mail-order dwellings democratized homebuying, one kit at a time.
Dubai’s first skyscraper will be included in new preservation initiative
The program will focus on buildings from the ’60s and ’70s, when Dubai entered a period of stunning growth.
Petition to save Venturi Scott Brown-designed museum in San Diego picks up steam
The proposed expansion plans to eliminate the colonnade courtyard currently fronting the museum.
Drones will help restore the Great Wall of China
Intel is using drones to identify which sections need to be prioritized for restoration.
Tokyo’s iconic Hotel Okura to reopen in 2019 after renovations
The iconic Hotel Okura, whose renovations were met with at outcry from the architecture and design community, will reopen in September 2019.
Glasgow School of Art will be rebuilt after devastating fire
Though it’s too early to tell exactly how much the new rebuild will cost, Glasgow School of Art director, Tom Inns, says it’s absolutely going to happen.
Ford taps Snøhetta to design new downtown Detroit campus
The Oslo-based firm will spearhead the Michigan Central Station revamp
Albright-Knox Art Gallery redesign 2.0 saves Bunshaft building
New scheme by OMA comes after months of criticism from architects and preservationists.
National Trust’s List of 11 Most Endangered Places includes Route 66, Mount Vernon
Historic homes, iconic city squares, and the roadside wonders of Route 66 are all at risk.
Nina Simone’s childhood home now a National Treasure
Organizers may use it to host artist residencies.