The University of Texas at Austin’s School of Architecture has taught Historic Preservation for nearly fifty years, beginning with an informal emphasis through courses taught by Blake Alexander (whose collections formed the nucleus of today’s Alexander Architectural Archive), Eugene George and others. By the mid-1970s, preservation was organized as a track within the Master of Architecture, under the leadership of Wayne Bell, FAIA. UT’s collection of historic structures at Winedale Center served as a summer preservation laboratory, including a HABS documentation studio that earned a number of Peterson Prizes.

In the early 1980s, the School began to offer historic preservation through a new degree, the MS in Architectural Studies. The MSAS opened preservation education here to students from a variety of backgrounds and expanded the program to encompass the variety of preservation professions: not only architects, but also historians, planners, conservators. In 2002 the degree was formalized as an MS in Historic Preservation (other smaller degrees born of the MSAS include Architectural History and Sustainable Development). The MSHP is available as a post-professional degree or a stand-alone professional degree. The core curriculum gives a thorough grounding in the four major areas of preservation: history and documentation, design, planning and policy, and materials conservation, with the opportunity to pursue one or more in greater depth.

















MSHP student Michelle Stanard evaluates masonry repair materials in UT's Architectural Conservation Laboratory
Photo credit: Fran Gale

Last year UT brought on board two new preservation faculty; Michael Holleran as program director, and Fran Gale as director of our Architectural Conservation Laboratory. Holleran came from the University of Colorado, where he started the graduate preservation program in the College of Architecture and Planning. He is an historian of preservation and of landscapes whose work won the Antoinette Downing Award from the Society of Architectural Historians. He earned a PhD in planning at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, served as Associate Dean of Research in Colorado, and founded the Colorado Center for Preservation Research. Gale, the first full-time director of the Conservation Lab, is a graduate of Columbia’s preservation program. She was formerly Director of Training at the National Park Service’s National Center for Preservation Technology and Training, and Technical Director at Prosoco, a manufacturer of products used in building restoration. Holleran and Gale each spent years in private practice.

With expanded faculty has come a renewed program. Architectural materials conservation has long been a strength at UT, and a grant from the University Co-op provided funds for a state-of-the art facility. Additional support from the campus has expanded the lab’s capabilities, and we now serve as an in-house consultant for UT campus projects, giving students a continuing window into historic property management on an 11 million square foot study area.

We also have returned the UT program to its design roots, reviving the M.Arch. preservation certificate from which the program originated (we have added a parallel specialization within the planning masters). The certificate gives an M.Arch. graduate a strong preservation background without the investment of time for a dual degree. Last fall we offered a preservation studio, with a focus on both architecture and communities. Students prepared designs for rehabilitation of Main Street buildings in Cuero, Texas, and for Austin’s exuberantly Art Moderne 1939 Bohn House. They investigated removal of a 1970s slipcover from the Prairie-style Byrne-Reed House as a new headquarters for Humanities Texas. All MSHP students now take at least one studio, and many are taking more than one.

UT early launched a preservation PhD, at first building on the faculty’s strength in architectural history. History and theory – now including landscape as well as architecture – continue as a strength, particularly in modernism and twentieth-century resources around the world. New faculty and interdisciplinary collaboration have allowed the doctoral program to grow to address research on emerging issues in practice, in preservation policy and the economic, social and environmental dimensions of sustainable preservation. Texas, with six of the country’s 21 largest cities, is an excellent place to study preservation in an environment of urban growth.

Students come from around the world to study preservation at UT-Austin, and we provide our students opportunities to study in a variety of international settings. Studio Mexico is a longstanding interdisciplinary initiative of the School of Architecture; last year preservation students worked on rehabilitation of an 18th-century hacienda in the Valley of Teotihuacán. One student has taken up the institutional planning and fundraising for the project as a thesis. Several preservation students have worked at UT’s Institute for Classical Archaeology sites at Chersonesos in the Ukraine and Metapontum in Italy. Another designed the adaptive use of a 15th-century chapel in Umbria as a town library. One is studying this semester in Turkey. Other programs are available or under development in China, France, and the Dominican Republic. Our Mebane Travel Scholarship supports student work abroad.
A major new initiative this year is a campus preservation plan funded by the Getty Foundation. The Getty Campus Heritage program has supported dozens of college and university preservation plans (UT’s is the first in Texas). The capabilities of our faculty, and our working relationship with campus architects and planners, allows UT’s plan to be led by the preservation program. Our outside partner for the project is Volz & Associates, an award-winning preservation firm based in Austin.

The project provides an opportunity for students to work with a team of professionals in shaping the future of our extraordinary architectural and landscape resources. During the Fall 2007 semester, students participated in the project through research in a National Register documentation course, and in a field methods course that studied building materials, construction methods, and existing conditions of these historic buildings. In Spring and Fall of 2008, students will investigate cultural landscapes. At the conclusion of this two-year project, the completed preservation plan will establish a framework for helping the University preserve the historic and cultural heritage of the campus.