This course is a survey of architecture in the United States. The organization, while broadly chronological, emphasizes themes around which important scholarship hos gathered. The central purpose is to acquaint you with major cultural, economic, technological, and environmental forces that have shaped buildings and settlements in North America for the last 400 years. To that end, we will study a mix of "highstyle" and "vernacular" architectures while encouraging you to think critically about these categories. Throughout the semester, you will be asked to grapple with both the content of assigned readings (the subject) and the manner in which authors present their arguments (the method). Louis Sullivan, for instance, gives us the tall office building "artistically considered" while Carol Willis presents it as a financial and legal artifact. What do you make of the difference? Finally, you will learn how to describe buildings. While mastery of architectural vocabulary is a necessary part of that endeavor, it is only a starting point. Rich or "thick" description is more than accurate prose. It is integral to understanding the built environment - indeed, to seeing it at all.
View syllabus for HSPV 5210 American Architecture.
View syllabus for HSPV 5210 American Architecture.
This course will examine the American domestic interior from the seventeenth through the twentieth centuries with emphasis on the cultural, economic, and technological forces that determined the decoration and furnishing of the American home. Topics covered include the evolution of floor plans; changes in finish details and hardware; the decorative arts; floor, wall, and window treatments; and developments in lighting, heating, plumbing, food preparation and service, as well as communication and home entertainment technologies. In addition to identifying period forms and materials, the course will offer special emphasis on historic finishes. The final project will involve re-creation of a historic interior based on in-depth documentary household inventory analysis, archival research, and study. Students will create a believable house interior and practice making design and furnishing choices based on evidence. Several class periods will be devoted to off-site field trips.
View syllabus for HSPV 5310 American Domestic Interiors.
Introduction to Architectural Conservation Science is an introduction to the technical study of traditional building materials. The course focuses on the properties, durability, and especially weathering of these materials and the basic laboratory-based methods that can be employed for their study and characterization. Lectures and coordinated laboratory sessions introduce the nature, structure, composition, and deterioration mechanisms of a wide array of building materials including earth, stone, brick, terra cotta, concrete, mortars and plasters, metals, wood, and paints. The course provides a basic knowledge of the major building materials in use before the Second World War in industrialized as well as pre-industrial traditional contexts Knowledge of basic college level chemistry is required.
View syllabus for HSPV 5550 Conservation Science.
View syllabus for HSPV 5550 Conservation Science.
This course explores the intersection between historic preservation, design and public policy, as it exists and as it is evolving. That exploration is based on the recognition that a challenging and challenged network of law and policy at the federal, state and local level has direct and profound impact on the ability to manage cultural resources, and that the pieces of that network, while interconnected, are not necessarily mutually supportive. The fundamental assumption of the course is that the preservation professional must understand the capabilities, deficiencies, and ongoing evolution of this network in order to be effective. The course will look at a range of relevant and exemplary laws and policies existing at all levels of government, examining them through case studies and in-depth analyses of pertinent programs and agencies at the local, state and federal level.
View syllabus for HSPV 5720 Preservation Through Public Policy.
View syllabus for HSPV 5720 Preservation Through Public Policy.
Heritage is always political. Such a statement might refer to the everyday politics of local stakeholder interests on one end of the spectrum, or the volatile politics of destruction and erasure of heritage during conflict, on the other. If heritage is always political then one might expect that the workings of World Heritage might be especially fraught given the international dimension. In particular, the intergovernmental system of UNESCO World Heritage must navigate the inherent tension between state sovereignty and nationalist interests and the wider concerns of a universal regime. The World Heritage List has almost 1200 properties has many such contentious examples, including sites in Iraq, Mali, Syria, Crimea, Palestine, Armenia and Cambodia. As an organization UNESCO was born of war with an explicit mission to end global conflict and help the world rebuild materially and morally yet has found its own history increasingly entwined with that of international politics and violence.
The goal of this course is to help students learn to research and contextualize the history of buildings and sites. In order to gain first-hand exposure to the actual materials of building histories, we will visit our neighborhood research sites and several key archival repositories.
Students will work directly with historical evidence, including maps, deeds, the census, city directories, insurance surveys, photographs, and many other kinds of archival materials. After discussing each type of document in terms of its nature and the motives for its creation, students will complete a series of projects that develop their facility for putting these materials to effective use.
Philadelphia is more our laboratory than a primary focus in terms of content, as the city is rich in institutions that hold over three centuries of such materials; students will find here both an exposure to primary documents of most of the types they might find elsewhere, as well as a sense of the culture of such institutions and of the kinds of research strategies that can be most effective. The final project is the completion of an historic register nomination.
View syllabus for HSPV 6000 Documentation I.
View syllabus for HSPV 6000 Documentation I.
A required praxis course designed to introduce students to the techniques and application of digital media for visual and textual communication. Techniques will be discussed for preservation use including survey, documentation, relational databases, and digital imaging and modeling.
Contemporary design can add value and meaning to historic settings of any age or scale, from individual landmarks to landscapes and neighborhoods. Rigorous dialogue with history and context enriches contemporary design. This seminar immerses designers, planners and preservationists in the challenges of design with existing structures and sites of varying size and significance. Readings of source materials, lectures and discussions explore how design and preservation theory, physical and intangible conditions, and time have shaped design response, as well as the political, cultural and aesthetic environments that influence regulation. Through sketch analytical exercises set in Philadelphia and outstanding case studies from around the world, students will learn to communicate their understanding of historic places, to critique and generate a range of responses to historic contexts. No prerequisites.
View syllabus for HPSV 6400 Contemporary Design in Historic Settings.
View syllabus for HPSV 6400 Contemporary Design in Historic Settings
Theories of historic preservation serve as models for practice, integrating the humanistic, artistic, design, scientific and political understandings of the field. This course examines the historical evolution of historic preservation, reviews theoretical frameworks and issues, and explores current modes of practice. Emphasis is placed on literacy in the standard preservation works and critical assessment of common preservation concepts. In addition to readings and lectures, case studies from contemporary practice will form the basis for short assignments. Professional ethics are reviewed and debated. The instructor’s permission is required for any student not registered in the Graduate Program in Historic Preservation. Note that the course is organized in two parts; the first half, on the basics of preservation theory, is taught in the fall semester (HSPV660) while the second half (HSPV661) takes place in the spring semester and engages advanced topics. Note: This course continues in the second half of the spring semester for another 0.5 CU.
View syllabus for HSPV 6600 Theories of Historic Preservation
The Preservation Studio is a practical course making architectural, urban and landscape conservation operations, bringing to bear the wide range of skills and ideas at play in the field of historic preservation. As part of the core MSHP curriculum the Studio experience builds on professional skills learned in the first-year core. The work requires intense collaboration as well as individual projects.
The Preservation Studio centers on common conflicts between historic preservation, social forces, economic interests, and politics. Recognizing that heritage sites are complex entities where communities, cultural and socio- economic realities, land use, building types, and legal and institutional settings are all closely interrelated, the main goals of the studio are (1) understanding and communicating the cultural significance of the built environment, (2) analyzing its relation to other economic, social, political and aesthetic values, and (3) exploring the creative possibilities for design, conservation and interpretation prompted by cultural significance.
Studio teams undertake documentation, planning and design exercises for heritage sites and their communities, working variously on research, stakeholder consultation, comparables analysis, writing policies and designing solutions.
Students work in teams as well as on individual projects.
The Graduate Program in Historic Preservation’s Thesis course is a two semester 2 CU capstone. The goal of the Thesis is demonstrated mastery of the research process by exploring a question of academic/professional relevance to the preservation field and presenting the results of the study in accordance with the highest standards of scholarly publishing. The Thesis spans the academic year, beginning with HSPV 710: Thesis I in the fall semester and continues in the spring with HSPV 711: Thesis II. Students are required to successfully complete 9-10 CUs (the first year of the curriculum) to qualify for Thesis. Dual degree students are expected to enroll in HSPV 710 before undertaking thesis studio in their respective dual program in their final year.
View syllabus for HSPV 7100 Thesis I.
View syllabus for HSPV 7100 Thesis I.
Pre-requisite: HSPV 555: Conservation Science and permission needed from department.
This seminar will offer an in-depth study of the conservation of masonry buildings and monuments. Technical and aesthetic issues will be discussed as they pertain to the understanding required for conservation practice. Part 1 will address a broad range of materials and masonry construction technologies, and deterioration phenomena; Part 2 will concentrate on conservation methodology as well as past and current approaches for the treatment of masonry structures. The subject will be examined through published literature and case studies. Students will gain practical experience through lab and field exercises and demonstrations. The subject matter is relevant to interested students of conservation and preservation, architecture, landscape architecture, architectural history, and archaeology.
