Career Discovery in Historic Preservation, Fall 2022

Join us in a lively conversation about Preservation and Professionalism. Penn Preservation alumni representing various facets of preservation practice will discuss the dimensions and scope of the profession as well as the responsibilities, authority, and ethics of the preservation professional. Our panelists will address the topic from their respective domains of expertise including policy and governance, design, conservation, public history, and education. The discussion will provide an overview of the role of preservation in relation to its allied disciplines and the relevance of historic preservation to contemporary social and environmental issues. The conversation will be moderated by Frank Matero, chair of the Graduate Program in Historic Preservation. Please consider attending our Weitzman School fall 2022 Open House, which includes the Career Discovery in Historic Preservation panel.

Moderator:

Frank Matero serves as the Gonick Family Professor and chair of the graduate program in historic preservation and as professor of architecture. Professor Matero is founder and director of the Architectural Conservation Laboratory and is Editor-in-Chief of Change Over Time journal. His teaching and research are focused on historic building technology and the conservation of building materials, with an emphasis on masonry and earthen construction, the conservation of archaeological sites, and issues related to preservation and appropriate technology for traditional societies and places. He has consulted on a wide range of conservation projects including the fortifications of Cairo and San Juan (Puerto Rico), Drayton Hall, the Guggenheim Museum and Trinity Church (New York), the Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials, Ellis Island, and the missions of California and Texas. His archaeological site work includes Mesa Verde, Casa Grande, Bandelier, Fort Union and Fort Davis, El Morro, and Indian Key in the United States, Gordion and Catal hoyuk in Turkey, and Chiripa in Bolivia.

He is a Professional Associate of the American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works and former Co-chair of the Research and Technical Studies Group and on the editorial boards of Conservation and Management of Archaeological Sites, the Journal of Architectural Conservation, and Cultural Resource Management. He has served on numerous professional boards including US/ICOMOS, Heritage Preservation, the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy, the AIA Historic Resources Committee, and the Fairmount Park Historic Preservation Trust, and The Woodlands.

Panelists:

Lauren Aguilar (MSHP’19, MArch’19) is a building enclosure expert based in Philadelphia, PA at Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates, Inc. She holds bachelor’s degrees in architecture and American studies from the University of California, Berkeley and master’s degrees in architecture and historic preservation from the University of Pennsylvania. She specializes in architectural investigation and design of a wide variety of exterior building enclosure systems and materials, from historic masonry to contemporary glazing systems. She has been involved in an assortment of project types, including historic preservation, repair and rehabilitation design, facade condition assessments and investigations, and roofing and waterproofing consulting for new, existing, and historically significant structures. Aguilar is a licensed drone pilot and is actively researching technology driven methods for documentation and representation of existing buildings.

Anthony Hita (MSHP’18) joined LimeWorks.us in 2018 as an architectural conservator overseeing the day-to-day operations of the company’s laboratory. Hita is responsible for laboratory analysis, technical documentation, sample preparation, report writing, product development, and client consultations. He specializes in masonry conservation and is an associate member of the American Institute for Conservation (AIC). In addition to his role in the laboratory, Hita also teaches conservation and preservation theory and practice during classes at the Craftwork Training Center. Hita has published several papers on architectural history and has been invited to speak nationally internationally on the topic of vernacular architecture several times. During his time with the company, Hita has participated in dozens of projects, helped develop six commercial restoration products, and conducted or overseen nearly 100 mortar analyses.

Prior to joining the firm, Hita was a student at the University of Pennsylvania where he wrote his thesis on the architectural history of the Brinton 1704 House in West Chester, PA. Other relevant projects completed by Hita at Penn include an archaeological survey of the water system of Fort Union, New Mexico; a survey of the masonry of the North Tower of Powderham Castle, Devon, England; and a historic resource survey of the First Baptist Church (Polite Temple) of Germantown, Pennsylvania. Hita also holds a Master of Divinity degree with a focus on Ancient Near Eastern Archaeology and ancient languages. Prior to returning to school, he participated in digs and taught programs on ANE archaeology.

Margaret (Molly) Lester (MSHP’12) is the Associate Director of the Urban Heritage Project, based in the Weitzman School of Design's Graduate Program for Historic Preservation and PennPraxis. In that role, she is the project manager for cultural landscape research, survey/documentation, and community engagement projects conducted with the National Park Service and other partners. In addition to her role with the Urban Heritage Project, Lester has been leading a research initiative about architect Minerva Parker Nichols for over a decade. As part of that project, she is a guest curator for the upcoming "What Minerva Built" exhibit funded by the Pew Center for Arts and Heritage, and she was a 2019/2020 Fellow for the James Marston Fitch Foundation. She was also a 2020/2021 grantee of the Sachs Program for Arts Innovation for her ongoing "Building Ghosts" project.

Lester joined PennPraxis in 2017 after three years of working as a freelance architectural historian and preservation planner. Previously, she worked as a program director for Partners for Sacred Places, overseeing a national consulting and grantmaking program for historic congregations. She has also worked as an architectural historian and historic tax credit consultant for Heritage Consulting Group, advising on the rehabilitation of historic properties around the country.

Lester is a contributor to the Hidden City Daily in Philadelphia, a former co-chair of the Young Friends of the Preservation Alliance, and the founder of the InKind Baking Project. She holds a Master of Science in Historic Preservation from the University of Pennsylvania and a Bachelor of Architectural History from the University of Virginia.

Elizabeth Rairigh (MSHP’05, MCP’05) is the Division Manager for the Preservation Services division at the PA State Historic Preservation Office, a bureau of the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission. Rairigh has an undergraduate degree in anthropology from the College of William and Mary in Virginia, dual master’s degrees in historic preservation and city planning from the University of Pennsylvania, and 20 years of experience in cultural resource management. Prior to joining the PA SHPO, Rairigh was a preservation planner and consultant in Massachusetts and Philadelphia.

Contact Kali Meeks, Associate Director for Professional Development and Leadership, for Zoom link.

If you require any accessibility accommodation, such as live captioning, audio description, or a sign language interpreter, please email news@design.upenn.edu to let us know what you need. Please note, we require at least 48 hours’ notice. If you register within 48 hours of this event, we won’t be able to secure the appropriate accommodations.