Conserving 20th Century Architecture

This book looks at approaches to appraising and conserving mainstream architecture of the 20th century - commercial buildings, industrial buildings and housing.

Over the concluding decades of the twentieth century, the historic preservation community increasingly turned its attention to modern buildings, including bungalows from the 1930s, gas stations and diners from the 1940s, and office buildings and architectural homes from the 1950s. Conservation efforts, however, were often hampered by a lack of technical information about the products used in these structures, and to fill this gap Twentieth-Century Building Materials was developed by the U.S. Department of the Interior’s National Park Service and first published in 1995. Now, this invaluable guide is being reissued—with a new preface by the book’s original editor. With more than 250 illustrations, including a full-color photographic essay, the volume remains an indispensable reference on the history and conservation of modern building materials. Thirty-seven essays written by leading experts offer insights into the history, manufacturing processes, and uses of a wide range of materials, including glass block, aluminum, plywood, linoleum, and gypsum board. Readers will also learn about how these materials perform over time and discover valuable conservation and repair techniques. Bibliographies and sources for further research complete the volume. The book is intended for a wide range of conservation professionals including architects, engineers, conservators, and material scientists engaged in the conservation of modern buildings, as well as scholars in related disciplines.

This book offers an international overview of how to apply the Conservation Management Plan (CMP) to the 20th-century architectural heritage. Although the CMP is universally considered a fundamental tool for sustainable management of the built heritage, the application to 20th-century buildings is still limited. The book illustrates selected case studies from different countries to discuss how best to preserve the authenticity of the original materials, manage changes in use, engage users and stakeholders in this process, and make conservation and sustainability work together. "Conserving 20th-century architecture" will provide insights for scholars and students and assist architects in drafting an effective conservation management plan.

The importance of protecting significant buildings from decay and destruction would seem to be undeniable. Yet whilst the majority of buildings of merit constructed before the Second World War have been highlighted as worthy of protection there is much indifference, and in some cases hostility towards many important post-war buildings. These deserve to receive wider formal recognition but in many cases continue to be mistreated or even demolished.This book examines many of the philosophical and practical issues surrounding the conservation of modern buildings and also the problems faced by building practitioners in dealing with buildings constructed in a wider range of styles and materials than at any other time. Climate change in particular has forced change in the way in which we think about buildings, with the pressures to address issues of energy efficiency becoming more urgent and likely to have consequences that may alter the perceived architectural and historic interest of modern and traditional buildings alike.

11 Post- tradition in Japanese culture -- Heritage -- 12 Industrial architecture -- 13 Landscape architecture -- 14 Middle- class housing -- Memory -- 15 Cultural institutions -- 16 Architectural photography -- Conservation -- 17 Laws and regulations -- 18 Technology -- Economy -- 19 Economic analysis -- Index of places -- Index of names

This timely volume brings together case studies that address the urgent need to manage energy use and improve thermal comfort in modern buildings while preserving their historic significance and character. This collection of ten case studies addresses the issues surrounding the improvement of energy consumption and thermal comfort in modern buildings built between 1928 and 1969 and offers valuable lessons for other structures facing similar issues. These buildings, international in scope and diverse in type, style, and size, range from the Shulman House, a small residence in Los Angeles, to the TD Bank Tower, a skyscraper complex in Toronto, and from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, a cultural venue in Lisbon, to the Van Nelle Factory in Rotterdam, now an office building. Showing ingenuity and sensitivity, the case studies consider improvements to such systems as heating, cooling, lighting, ventilation, and controls. They provide examples that demonstrate best practices in conservation and show ways to reduce carbon footprints, minimize impacts to historic materials and features, and introduce renewable energy sources, in compliance with energy codes and green-building rating systems. The Conserving Modern Heritage series, launched in 2019, is written by architects, engineers, conservators, scholars, and allied professionals. The books in this series provide well-vetted case studies that address the challenges of conserving twentieth-century heritage.

“The absence heretofore of a comparably thoroughgoing but accessible resource on a topic of such urgent public concern was a glaring lapse that makes this deeply researched, lucidly written, and helpfully annotated book an invaluable addition to the literature.”— New York Review of Books Time Honored is a comprehensive survey of the practice, theory, and structure of architectural heritage conservation throughout the world. Offering an argument for why architectural conservation is indispensable to modern life, Time Honored describes its parameters and evolution in an historical context, and then methodically presents approaches used in various countries, showing how historic preservation in the West differs from conservation in the rest of the world. Illustrated throughout with over 300 photographs, drawings, maps, and charts. No other book navigates the global conservation programs, policies, and project types so completely.

The Twentieth-Century Historic Thematic Framework is a tool for identifying and assessing the heritage of the twentieth-century. It is a way to organize and define history in order to help identify heritage sites and place them in context. It is not a history of the twentieth century, nor is it a database of significant sites, but instead is an analysis of the century's development, emphasizing global forces, trends, and phenomena that shaped the built environment. Commissioned by the Getty Conservation Institute (GCI) working in collaboration with the ICOMOS Twentieth Century Heritage International Scientific Committee, it identifies the principal social, technological, political, and economic drivers that shaped the buildings, cities, industries and landscapes of the twentieth century globally. These have been distilled into ten succinct themes:1.Rapid Urbanization and the Growth of Large Cities2.Accelerated Scientific and Technological Development3.Mechanized and Industrialized Agriculture4.World Trade and Global Corporations5.Transportation Systems and Mass Communication6.Internationalization, New Nation-States, and Human Rights7.Conserving the Natural Environment, Buildings, and Landscapes8.Popular Culture and Tourism9.Religious, Educational, and Cultural Institutions10.War and its AftermathThe Twentieth-Century Historic Thematic Framework is offered freely for use, trial, debate, and discussion to support the conservation of significant heritage places of the twentieth century. It is a tool that can be utilized and adapted by anyone involved in heritage conservation around the world. Our hope is that it will aid many forms of research, analysis, and survey work, and ultimately help sustain and conserve the heritage of the twentieth century.