Historic Preservation

Historic preservation seeks to find effective and artful ways of maintaining and reusing significant buildings, landscapes, and communities. Central to the discipline is the attempt to preserve cultural identity in the face of the threats of urban sprawl and loss of social diversity.

The Historic Preservation Program at The University of Texas at Austin exposes students to multiple fields in the discipline of historic preservation—architectural conservation and documentation, historic site management, and preservation planning and development. The coursework is practical, technical, and theoretical in scope, encompassing the study of history, research techniques, materials conservation, documentation and interpretation of historic resources, restoration methodologies, and sensitive design for adaptive reuse.

Students explore a wide array of historic properties, from rural vernacular sites to significant works of the Modern Movement, from interior furnishings and buildings to landscapes and urban centers. The special emphasis of the program is on works of the later nineteenth and twentieth centuries, especially on examples of Modernism. International travel is strongly supported by the program. Recent students have studied in Italy, Mexico, Turkey, and Ukraine, and there are also programs currently under development in China, France, and the Dominican Republic.