MASTER OF PRESERVATION STUDIES FALL 2015
ANNUAL PROGRAM UPDATE LETTER FROM THE DIRECTOR Formal education in architectural preservation, including engagement in real and meaningful preservation activities in the New Orleans region, has always been a hallmark of the MPS program and new ground was broken this past semester especially. The director of Children’s Hospital asked MPS faculty and students to document and offer preservation recommendations for Children’s Hospital’s expansion into the historically significant Maritime Hospital on Tchoupitoulas Street. This offered a perfect opportunity for the MPS Studio II: Urban Conservation to participate in one of the City’s largest preservation projects. The class of 15 students worked in coordination with Eskew+Dumez+Ripple, architects for the hospital, and focused on the two oldest structures on the campus. Professor Beth Jacob’s description of the project in this newsletter says more. The spring field trip to Panama as part of the International Practice course was especially successful in large part due to the enthusiastic help given us by MPS alumni Daniel Young-Torquemada and Malena Rojas. The superb site visits and presentations were given by an array of impressive local professionals, many with Tulane ties. Student Nathan Lott’s insightful reflections on the trip, included later in this update, speak to the merits of getting out there and experiencing preservation practice in other countries first-hand. As always, it was a special pleasure seeing the MPS class of 2015 graduate and begin to enter the profession. Most have already reported that they are engaged in interesting new career pursuits. The essay by recent graduate Erin Guerra testifies to the amazing voyage of intellectual discovery one can undertake in completing the capstone Thesis experience. There will be several changes to courses and staffing planned for the coming year. Laura Blokker will be teaching History of North
American Architecture, while conservator and digital documentation expert Michael Shoriak will be taking over Studio I: Building Conservation. We will miss Professors Daniel Hammer and Eugene Cizek in those roles but salute the new steps they are taking in their careers, including Daniel’s rise to the position of Deputy Director of the Historic New Orleans Collection and Gene’s completion of a book on preserving Faubourg Marigny. Both will continue as occasional lecturers and resources for the program. In addition, Marie Chinappi’s role as assistant to the Director is being assumed by Margot Ferster (MPS ’15) who won the Outstanding Service to the MPS Program Award at graduation in May. In entering my fifth year as director of the MPS program, it has been especially satisfying to see so many positive changes to the program come to fruition. Updates to the content and rigor of the program and some operational changes to the department have occurred through hard work and the cooperation of many, and I especially thank Dean Kenneth Schwartz and Associate Dean for Academics Wendy Redfield for their support. The Tulane MPS experience is operating at an all-time high with the entire faculty focused on providing the best quality education of is kind in architectural heritage management. Onward we go! John Stubbs Director and Favrot Senior Professor of Practice
This MPS Program Update features news as well as essays from faculty and students on some of the key aspects of the program:
INTERNATIONAL FOCUS, NEW ORLEANS FOCUS, COMMUNITY SERVICE, AND STUDENT TRAVEL
NEW ORLEANS FOCUS
NEW ORLEANS PRESERVATION TIMELINE TRIPLES IN SIZE BY DANIELLE DELSOL (MPS ’11) The second phase of the New Orleans Preservation Timeline project is complete, thanks to a generous grant from the U.S. National Park Service via the Louisiana State Historic Preservation Office. The New Orleans Preservation Timeline (architecture.tulane.edu/ preservation-project), a project of the Tulane Master of Preservation Studies department in 2013, debuted in April 2014 at the Preservation Matters III: Economics of Authenticity symposium. The website went live with 35 entries that detail the significant events, people/ organizations, and places in the history of New Orleans’ illustrious preservation movement. The website garnered much interest at its debut, and many agree it could serve as a model for other preservation-minded cities, such as Charleston or Boston, to emulate in the documentation of their histories. The Preservation Timeline has served as a wealth of information for many in the past year, helping people understand the preservation wins and losses and the overall evolution of the city’s historic architecture and neighborhoods. The second phase of the Timeline project has bumped the number of entries to over 100. In addition to informative written narratives, the website features a wealth of historic photographs, thanks largely to the generosity of The Historic New Orleans Collection, Tulane’s Southeastern Architectural Archive, and others. Most of these 100 entries were started by students. Their submissions were then enlarged and perfected with the careful diligence of project editor Gabrielle Begue (MPS ’12). By inserting historical information and original source material into most entries, Begue has ensured that the Preservation Timeline is a resource that can be understood by everyone, but simultaneously provides valuable information that even the most particular researcher can use. The new and improved site will be live in early July. In addition to the Louisiana SHPO, the Timeline’s completion is also thanks to the generous support and time of MPS advisor Ann Masson. Project directors John Stubbs and Danielle Del Sol (MPS ’11) are anxious to spread the word about this new and improved tool, and have printed cards to advertise the site in conjunction with this new phase of improvements. Contact Del Sol at danielle.delsol@gmail.com if you would like to offer a stack of cards at your place of business.
INTERNATIONAL FOCUS
A GRAD TO POST-GRAD LEARNING ODYSSEY BY ERIN GUERRA (MPS ’15) As I approached the end of the second semester in the MPS program, I decided to take advantage of the remaining time and pursued a few opportunities to gain experience in other facets of the preservation field. The ensuing year-long journey has provided considerable insight into international practices and added significantly to my passion for travel. I began with a preservation planning course with University of Pennsylvania and UNESCO-WHITRAP in Shanghai, China. This course involved the study of unique lilong housing blocks, a sort of English row house and Chinese courtyard hybrid, in the city’s downtown. Next was a three-week summer school in traditional building skills organized by the Prince’s Foundation for Building Community in the United Kingdom. Courses and tutorials included sacred geometry, simple three-dimensional structures, site sketching, life drawing, timber framing, stonemasonry, pargetting, lime plastering, and thatching. Involvement in the inaugural Trullo Restoration Workshop in Puglia, Italy followed soon after. These vernacular stone structures, trulli in plural form, are scattered throughout the limestone-rich region and tell of the locale’s agricultural nature. We were tasked with the deconstruction and restoration of an outer, conical roof shell, which, along with a stone shepherd’s hut side project, was a great handson education of the ancient technique of dry stone construction and its structural methods. Rounding out the last year was a 5-month internship placement amongst the Research Group on Materials for Sustainable Building Construction at CEFET-MG in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. This opportunity came about through IAESTE and involved technical work for the comparison of various treatment approaches on cellulose-cement composites, one of which includes a mixture of rice husk ash that was greatly inspired by the pozzolanic methods utilized in Ancient Greece and Rome. The combination of these opportunities has resulted in a rich learning experience and introduced me to many amazing people, projects, ideas, cultures, and places, many of which were incorporated into my thesis research. Though what has been most exciting is realizing the vastness of the preservation field and the countless ways to learn more and participate in its growth. Here’s to hoping for more years like this one.
COMMUNITY SERVICE
MPS STUDENTS STUDY THE FORMER MARINE HOSPITAL CAMPUS BY PROFESSOR BETH JACOB Students in the Spring 2015 MPS Urban Conservation studio completed a preservation planning study of the former Marine Hospital campus, located on the block bounded by Henry Clay Avenue, Tchoupitoulas Street, State Street, and Leake Road. The site, which was once part of the de Bore sugar plantation and later housed a brick mill, was purchased by the United States government in 1883 for the construction of a Marine Hospital. Later known as the U.S. Public Health Service, the institution was rebuilt under the direction of Acting Supervising Architect of the Treasury, James A. Wetmore, in the early 1930s. The hospital remained in operation until 1981, when it was sold to the State of Louisiana and converted to the New Orleans Adolescent Hospital. The site was acquired by Children’s Hospital in 2014. Working in small groups, students researched the complex history of the site, documented the existing buildings and landscape, and developed options for the adaptive reuse of key structures. For the two oldest buildings on the site, the c. 1830s Overseer’s Cottage and the late-19th century Director’s House, students used architectural documentation, materials analysis, and archival research to understand the evolution of each structure, which then informed their preservation recommendations and reuse proposals. Other students focused more broadly on the A.D. Taylor-designed landscape and on the remaining 1930s buildings, including the residential duplexes, research and utility buildings, and the iconic cupola-capped main hospital building. The class presented its findings and recommendations to representatives of Children’s Hospital and Eskew+Dumez+Ripple, the architecture firm currently developing the master plan for the hospital’s expansion.
STUDENT TRAVEL
REFLECTIONS ON PANAMA BY NATHAN LOTT (MPS ’15) Published in 1913, New Orleans: A Descriptive View Book in Colors, touted the city’s “quaint history and rare romance” and her port, saying: “The Panama Canal is 600 miles nearer New Orleans than any other large seaport. When completed it will increase New Orleans exports and imports many millions of dollars.” 102 years later, the taxi ride from the airport to the Casco Antigua (Panama City’s old quarter) sped me past gleaming high rises and billboards for international brands, then wound through residential streets lined with reinforced concrete walk-ups, their balconies bedecked in the waving laundry of the working-class. The friendly driver (a fan of American football) deposited me in the Casco, where façades erected by Franco-American canal-building interests are now held upright by steel girders—their roofs long since collapsed. Once home to squatters and gangs, these shells are being transformed into boutique hotels and upscale condos. TSA grad Daniel Young-Torquemada is among the country’s leading rehabilitation architects and played gracious host to our visiting MPS cohort. We saw churches from each of the last four centuries, Spanish forts on the Atlantic and Panama Viejo, the first European settlement on the Pacific. Before being sacked by the British, it exemplified the same ideas about town planning seen in the French Quarter. Both Panama Viejo and the Casco Antigua are now world heritage sites, safeguarded by committed historians and regulators, yet menaced by intrusive roads and the pressing need for land and financial resources to support human development.
Photos from right to left: Preservation Timeline card; Erin Guerra (far right) with other international students in Parque da Serra do Curral, Brazil; MPS students outside Marine Hospital Campus; 4th century church in Panama
New Orleans and Panama City are, if not sister cities, cousins. Each was a Caribbean capital, though neither overlooks the Gulf of Mexico. Panama City was linked to the Atlantic by an overland road just as New Orleans was situated at the river terminus of a portage to Lake Pontchartrain. In each place, slavery, immigration and a succession of foreign rulers gave rise to a polyglot culture. The Panamanian landscape was reshaped for human commerce just as levees and pumps re-engineered the Mississippi. Today, our cities thrive on heritage tourism while struggling to include all citizens in the growing prosperity. 3
ALUMNI + FACULTY NEWS Louisiana Lt. Governor Jay Dardenne announced Phil Boggan (MPS ’01) as the head of the Office of Cultural Development (OCD). He has been with the Department of Culture, Recreation and Tourism since 2002. In that time he has served as deputy assistant secretary of the OCD, head of the Division of Historic Preservation and director of the Louisiana Main Street program. Michelle Brenner (MPS ’14) is now a project manager for Staub Window Restorations, LLC. in New Orleans. ZoAnn Campana (MPS ’14) is working on the second phase of an architectural survey of the Newlands neighborhood in Reno, Nevada as a contractor for the City of Reno (she completed the first phase as the MPS practicum project). The neighborhood is a collection of largely Period Revival and Craftsman homes, both grand and modest, and the survey consists of 605 total resources. Wes Cheek (MPS ’12) is working to complete a Ph.D. in Tulane’s City, Culture and Community program. He presented research at the Vernacular Architecture Forum conference in Chicago this June and also presented at the City, Culture and Community Graduate Student Symposium: Social Justice and the City last March. Additionally, he taught last September in the Disaster Mitigation for Urban Cultural Heritage International Training Program at Ritsumeikan University in Japan, and will be doing so again this upcoming fall. Margot Ferster (MPS ’15) is working as a conservator with Cypress Building Conservation in New Orleans and will be the new administrative assistant to the MPS program starting in July. Whitney Jordan (M.Arch ’14 with a Preservation Studies Certificate) is working in Portland, Oregon for Zimmer Gunsul Frasca Architects. Kate Kenwright (MPS ’15) has taken a job as Historic Preservation Specialist at The L’Enfant Trust in Washington, D.C., an organization that works to preserve and revitalize Washington’s historic communities. She works with both the Conservation Easement Program and the organization’s new Historic Properties Redevelopment Program, the first revolving fund in the D.C. area. Sarah Norman Mason (MPS ’14) is the new director of the Alexandria Historic Preservation Commission. Former MPS professor and assistant to the MPS program, Ann Masson, received the esteemed Eugenie Schwartz & Grace Gage Preservation Award offered by VCPORA for her outstanding work in preserving the French Quarter during her long career. Her long list of civic service and accomplishments towards documenting, preserving and advocating for the French Quarter’s preservation was honored at a luncheon on June 28th. MPS Restoration architect and
Ann Masson with Lloyd Shields, MPS Preservation Law Professor and Chairman of the Tulane Architecture School Board of Advisors, upon receiving VCPORA’s biennial award.
MPS professor Robert Cangelosi described Ann as today’s version of the two greatest other French Quarter preservation advocates Elizabeth Werlein and Mary Morrison. Gordon McLeod (MPS ’11) is now Director of Land Use for New Orleans Councilmember Susan Guidry. Frank Rabalais (MPS ’02) is historic tax credit consultant for New Orleans-based Crescent Growth Capital, which has closed over $100 million in Historic Tax Credit financings over the past few years. Most recently, four of the eighteen winners selected by the Louisiana Landmarks Society as recipients of the 2015 Awards for Excellence in Historic Preservation employed Crescent Growth Capital as their financial arranger/historic tax credit consultant. MPS instructor Cynthia Steward (MPS ’11) and Nicole Hobson-Morris (MPS ’01), executive director of the LA SHPO, are about to publish a booklet called “Resilient Heritage: Protecting Your Historic Home from Natural Disasters.” The booklet highlights the best practices for hardening historic homes in Louisiana, including anchoring structures, floodproofing, etc. Aimed at owners of residential properties, the booklet also offers insights for local historic commission members, city government staff, and professionals in related fields. Yvette Tyler (MPS ’14) is working for the City of New Orleans as an Analyst with the Capital Projects Administration. James Wade (MPS ’12) has moved to Natchez, Miss. where he has purchased an 1847 townhouse and is in the process of restoring it. He is working for the Pilgrimage Garden Club at Longwood and is currently writing an interpretation plan for that house.
See the New Orleans Preservation Timeline for things dear to your heart
architecture.tulane.edu/preservation-project
architecture.tulane.edu/mps
MASTER OF PRESERVATION STUDIES The Master of Preservation Studies program in the Tulane School of Architecture offers an interdisciplinary education in preservation practice dealing with individual historic buildings, historic sites, and groups of buildings forming neighborhoods and commercial districts. The setting for much of the program’s study is three-centuries-old New Orleans and its environs that possess a wealth of historic resources, much of which remains unexplored. The city’s experience in architectural heritage protection is among the most distinguished in the country, as is witnessed by the MPS program-produced New Orleans Preservation Timeline project. The MPS program has four principal tracks of learning:
MPS STUDENTS AT-A-GLACE
66
TOTAL GRADUATES SINCE FALL 2013
PRIOR EDUCATION UNDERGRADUATE DEGREES
28%
6%
9%
4%
Architecture
History
8%
Business
STUDENTS
Psychology
Art History
4%
English Literature
17%
have graduate degrees
4%
Urban Studies/ Urban Planning
Other
Interior Design, Media Arts & Business, Classical Studies, Human Development & Social Policy, Film & TV, Technology Education
VALUABLE STUDENT EXPERIENCES
• Preservation Theory and Law; • Documentation and Preservation Planning;
Specific Courses
• Conservation Technology, and; • Architectural History. Its course work may be accomplished in three semesters: two of intensive course work plus a semester to complete either a thesis or a work practicum. Internships and work towards completion of the capstone thesis and practicum courses may be accomplished during the intervening summer months. The Tulane Master of Preservation Studies program is situated within the Tulane School of Architecture and cooperates with the School’s other departments with considerable shared instruction. It offers minors in the field to undergraduates and graduates in other programs within the School of Architecture.
People and Professional Connections
Field Studies Travel Experiences
Including: History of Architecture, Preservation Law, Preservation Technology, and Economics & Practices of Preservation
GRADUATES OF THE PROGRAM
AREAS OF EMPLOYMENT IN THE FIELD
22%
Architectural Practice
20%
Government
11%
Specialty Consulting
32%
Other
Cultural Resources Management, Construction/ Restoration, Non-profit work, Real estate, Advocacy, Tourism and Marketing, & Research
2%
13%
Museum
Educational