An Iowa team of high school students takes first place honors in the National History Day National Contest for Junior Group Documentary, “Rural Electrification: Breaking Barriers with the Flip of a Switch.” This documentary was created by Addision Naslund, Ben Philips, Hayden Wahlberg, Josie Jacobs and Lainey Schuknecht of Akron Westfield Middle School. Electricity was… Read more »
2020 Preservation at Its Best: Public Project The 1904 Winneshiek County Courthouse is a Beax-Arts Classicism style building. The approximately 26,700 SF courthouse is a key contributing structure to the Broadway-Phelps Park Historic District listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The building remains relatively unaltered featuring ornate decorative plaster, art glass dome, terrazzo… Read more »
2020 Preservation at Its Best: Residential Simmons House was built between the years of 1899-1900 by F.W. Simmons and boasts 5013 square feet of living space. It was designed by New York architect F.R. Comstock and is the anchoring structure for the east end of the Fifth Street Bluff Historic District. When purchased by the… Read more »
2020 Preservation at Its Best: Special Project The Le Mars Historic Preservation Commission used a variety of approaches to enhance awareness of local history in the years leading up to the city’s 150th anniversary in 2019. The focus was the publication of a hard cover pictorial history of Le Mars containing over 1800 images and… Read more »
2020 Preservation at Its Best: Adaptive Reuse As one of Iowa’s premier performing arts organizations, Des Moines Metro Opera (DMMO) embarked on a $3.5 million dollar campaign to restore and expand the National Register of Historic Places Carnegie Library they call home. The opera had maintained the building’s historic integrity. Working with OPN Architects created… Read more »
2020 Preservation at Its Best: Large Commercial An historic building in downtown Jefferson was chosen as the site for the new tenant. Working with architects, engineers, and the State Historical Preservation Society, the developer made plans to rehabilitate this 100+ year old building, which was formerly known as the Odd Fellows Building and features a… Read more »
2020 Preservation at Its Best: Rural Preservation The Graceland Cemetery Chapel in Avoca, Iowa is a 320 square-foot single-story, single-space building constructed around 1875. The chapel, also referred to as the “Octagon Building,” is a picturesque object-in-field structure acting as a key focal point in the undulating wooded landscape of the surrounding Graceland Cemetery. The… Read more »
2020 Preservation at Its Best: Small Commercial Transforming 1800 square feet of an 1868 grain elevator into a coffee shop poses unique challenges. The owners designed the interior to keep with the integrity and character of the stone building and wood hoppers, which are original to the building. They used scrap lumber, tin, and recycled… Read more »
2020 Preservation at Its Best: Community Effort As Iowa’s only National Trust Historic Site, Brucemore is a significant tourist attraction in Iowa, greeting more than 1,000,000 visitors since 1981. The restoration is part of a multiyear, $4.5 million effort to preserve the 19th century Queen-Anne style mansion. The project focused on the roof slate, window… Read more »
2020 Preservation at its Best: Sustainability Architectural Record christened 711 High Street the Building of the Decade the year it was built. By 1939-standards, the beautiful art deco building incorporated many unique and innovative systems. Principal understood the building’s significance as well as the impact it would have on current and future employees. The 473,000… Read more »
