European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture Mies Van Der Rohe Award 2001 Book

This is a book for the general public—lots of illustrations and easy read for those unfamiliar with building preservation. 350 pages on colonial mansions, barns, muskrat-skinning sheds, etc. in this book about a “region of regions”—the Delaware Valley. Delaware-centric, as the two contributors worked their at the Center for Historic Architecture and Design (in collaboration with HABS), but it does include regional examples from NJ, PA, MD, and VA as well. This is not style-obsessed but instead focuses on change over time in looks and use (an archaeological approach): not looking for purity but dissecting alterations. It argues for the study of buildings to better understand people: “how they saw themselves, their neighbors, and their workday world in all its complexity—and how they projected that sense of self and society into the substance of their environment" (350).