ARTICLE 24

Historic Preservation: Keeping the Story While Making Room for the Future

I think there is a misunderstanding about historic preservation.

People sometimes hear the word preservation and imagine that every old building has to remain exactly the way it was the day it was built.

Don’t touch it.
Don’t change it.
Don’t add anything new.

Just freeze it in time.

But buildings were never meant to work that way.

Cities change. Families change. Businesses change. Technology changes. Building codes change. The way we heat buildings, move through them, work in them and live in them changes.

If an old building is going to survive another hundred years, sometimes it has to change too.

The question is how.

Old Buildings Tell Stories

I’ve always been drawn to older buildings.

Not necessarily because they are perfect.

A lot of them aren’t.

Floors slope. Walls aren’t square. Foundations move. Windows leak. Mechanical systems have been squeezed into spaces where nobody ever imagined ductwork would need to go.

And structurally, they can be incredibly challenging.

You might be dealing with unreinforced masonry, old timber framing, undersized foundations, unusual roof systems or structural methods that haven’t been commonly used in decades.

Sometimes the original construction is excellent.

Sometimes you’re trying to figure out what somebody did during a renovation in 1957.

And sometimes you’re looking at something thinking:

How has this been standing for 120 years?

But old buildings have something that is incredibly difficult to recreate in a new building:

time.

You can reproduce brick.

You can reproduce trim.

You can manufacture distressed wood and design something that looks historic.

But you can’t manufacture 100 years of people walking through the same doorway.

You can’t recreate the fact that a storefront once served an entirely different community, or that several generations of families lived above it.

That history becomes part of the identity of a place.

And once it is gone, it is very difficult to get back.

Then There Is the Code

This is one of the less glamorous parts of historic preservation, but probably one of the most important.

A building constructed in 1890 obviously wasn’t designed around today’s structural, seismic, accessibility, energy, electrical, mechanical or life-safety standards.

That doesn’t necessarily mean an existing building suddenly has to meet every requirement we would apply to a brand-new building.

Existing-building codes recognize that doing that would make the reuse of many older buildings practically impossible.

The International Existing Building Code provides different paths for addressing repairs, alterations, additions, changes of occupancy and historic buildings.

Under the work-area method, alterations are generally broken into different levels.

Level 1 alterations are typically more limited work involving the removal and replacement or covering of existing materials, elements, equipment or fixtures.

Level 2 alterations can involve reconfiguration of spaces and systems within a defined work area.

Level 3 alterations involve more extensive work and can trigger additional requirements because of how much of the building is being affected.

Then there are separate considerations for additions, changes in occupancy, accessibility, structural work and historic buildings.

That’s where an apparently simple renovation can become complicated.

You start moving walls.

Then you discover something structural.

You change how the building is being used.

Now you’re looking at occupant loads, exiting, accessibility or fire protection.

You open a ceiling and discover electrical work from several generations of renovations.

One thing leads to another.

Existing-building codes give architects, engineers and code officials tools to work through those conditions rather than assuming the only possible answer is demolition.

That’s important.

The Hardest Part May Be What You Don't Know

This is one of the realities of working with old buildings that is difficult to explain until you've actually worked on one.

There are unknowns. A lot of them.

You can measure the building.

You can research its history.

You can look at old drawings if they exist.

You can bring in architects, structural engineers and contractors.

You can study cracks, crawl through attics and basements and make educated assumptions about how the building was constructed.

But at some point there is still a wall in front of you.

And you don't know exactly what is behind it until somebody opens it.

That's part of what makes these projects complicated.

We can plan.

We can investigate.

We can use our experience to make educated guesses.

But there is a difference between an educated guess and knowing.

Maybe you open a wall and discover beautiful heavy timber framing in excellent condition.

Maybe you find masonry that needs reinforcement.

Maybe a beam isn't where you expected it to be.

Maybe somebody removed part of a bearing wall 50 years ago.

Maybe you discover three generations of electrical work layered on top of each other.

Sometimes you find a problem.

Sometimes you find something much better than you expected.

And sometimes you find something that completely changes the design.

That's why selective demolition can be such a valuable tool early in a project.

Instead of tearing everything apart, carefully selected areas can be opened to help determine how the building was actually constructed.

Expose a connection.

Look at a beam.

Verify a wall assembly.

Investigate a foundation.

Find out what is above a ceiling.

A relatively small amount of investigation can sometimes eliminate a very large amount of guessing.

It doesn't remove every unknown.

Nothing really can.

But it can turn some of those unknowns into information before major design and construction decisions are made.

“Wouldn’t It Be Cheaper to Tear It Down?”

I’ve heard some version of this throughout my career.

And sometimes the answer is:

Yes.

It may absolutely be cheaper to demolish an old building and build something new.

New construction gives you clean dimensions, predictable materials, new structural systems and fewer surprises hiding behind a wall.

Restoration doesn’t.

And honestly, I think that's one of the biggest reasons old buildings get demolished.

Sometimes people simply don't want the headache.

I understand that.

An old building can carry more uncertainty, more investigation, more coordination and potentially more risk than starting with a clean site.

There may be a point where the cost and complications simply don't make sense.

But before getting there, I think we have to ask another question:

Is what we're about to lose worth working through some of that difficulty?

That answer isn't going to be the same for every building.

Sometimes it isn't worth it.

Sometimes it absolutely is.

But we don't always know the answer from standing outside the building and looking at it.

Sometimes you have to investigate first.

I think about it a little like restoring an old vehicle.

From a purely practical standpoint, rebuilding a 60-year-old truck can make absolutely no financial sense.

You can spend an incredible amount of money rebuilding an engine, repairing rust, tracking down parts, replacing wiring and restoring the interior.

You could probably buy something newer for less.

But that's not really the point.

Nobody restores a 1965 truck because it has better fuel economy than a new one.

They restore it because there is something there worth keeping.

Architecture can be the same way.

The challenge is figuring out what is actually worth keeping and then being smart about everything around it.

Sometimes Preservation Requires Creativity

This is where I think preservation becomes really interesting.

The choices don't have to be:

Restore everything exactly as it was.

or

Tear everything down.

There is a lot of territory between those two answers.

One of the more dramatic examples is Hearst Tower in New York.

The original Hearst building was constructed in the late 1920s near Columbus Circle. Decades later, Foster + Partners designed a contemporary glass-and-steel tower that rises from the historic base.

Old and new aren't pretending to be the same thing.

That's exactly what makes it interesting.

You can look at the building and understand its history almost immediately.

The old building is still there.

The new building is clearly new.

Now, I'm certainly not suggesting we need to start putting skyscrapers on top of historic buildings in Helena.

That's not the point.

The point is that there is almost always more than one way to think about an existing building.

Maybe you preserve a façade.

Maybe an addition is deliberately contemporary.

Maybe a new structural frame is inserted inside the existing shell.

Maybe a building gets a completely different use.

Maybe portions that have been altered beyond recognition are reconstructed while original portions are restored.

Maybe you don't touch very much at all.

Every building has a different answer.

Sometimes You Don't Have to Save the Whole Building

Years ago, while at a previous firm, I was part of a team that pursued the Central School project here in Helena.

One of the ideas we explored was whether portions of the existing school, particularly part of its historic façade, could somehow be preserved and incorporated into the new building.

Not necessarily keeping every square foot of the old structure.

Not pretending the new school was an old building.

Just asking whether a piece of the building's history could remain as part of whatever came next.

I still think there is something powerful about that idea.

A preserved wall, entrance, façade or other meaningful piece of an existing building can become more than decoration.

It can become a physical connection between generations of people who used the same place.

Students could walk into a completely modern school while still seeing a piece of the building that generations before them knew.

Now, needless to say, we didn't get that project.

But I still remember the idea.

And that's really the point.

Preservation doesn't always have to mean saving an entire building exactly as it exists.

Sometimes the creative solution is figuring out which piece carries the story and finding a way to bring that piece forward.

Helena Already Has Something Most Cities Try to Create

This is something I've really started noticing walking around Helena.

There is an incredible amount of architectural richness here.

Stone.

Brick.

Cornices.

Arches.

Deep window openings.

Detailed storefronts.

Ornamental masonry.

Buildings where somebody clearly cared about what happened at the top, the bottom and around every opening.

And yet you can also see places where some of that richness disappeared over time.

That happened all over America.

Sometimes ornament deteriorated and was expensive to repair.

Sometimes owners wanted buildings to look more modern.

Sometimes storefronts were covered.

Windows were replaced.

Cornices were removed because they were deteriorating or considered dangerous.

Mechanical systems needed somewhere to go.

Energy performance became more important.

Maintenance was deferred.

Materials disappeared from common use.

And perhaps most importantly, some of the people who understood how to build and repair these things disappeared too.

We Lost More Than Ornament

There is a level of craftsmanship in older buildings that is becoming increasingly difficult to reproduce.

Historic masonry wasn't simply today's masonry with older bricks.

Historic windows aren't identical to modern replacement windows.

Old plaster assemblies behaved differently.

Heavy timber construction behaves differently.

Old stone foundations behave differently.

Terra cotta, ornamental sheet metal, carved stone and elaborate woodwork each required specialized knowledge.

In many cases, the tradespeople who understood these systems learned from someone who learned from someone else.

When that chain disappears, the knowledge can disappear with it.

Then somebody looks at a deteriorating 120-year-old cornice and says:

Why don't we just remove it?

And economically, you can understand why.

Rebuilding that detail may require a specialist, custom fabrication and considerably more money than covering the area with something simple.

Do that once and maybe nobody notices.

Do it building after building, decade after decade, and eventually the architecture of a city becomes flatter.

Simpler.

More generic.

You don't lose everything at once.

You lose it one detail at a time.

Sometimes the Best Design Move Is Removing Something

The opposite is also true.

Old doesn't automatically mean original.

Historic buildings accumulate things.

Signs.

Awnings.

Dropped ceilings.

Fake stone.

Vinyl siding.

Mechanical equipment.

Boarded windows.

Random additions.

Suspended ceilings covering beautiful structure.

Storefront systems installed decades after the original building.

After enough renovations, the original architecture can almost disappear.

Sometimes preservation actually means taking things away.

You start peeling back layers.

An old photograph shows that an opening used to be somewhere else.

You remove drywall and discover brick.

You find an old beam.

You discover a transom above a ceiling.

Suddenly something about the building makes sense that didn't make sense before.

That's one of the parts of existing-building work I enjoy.

It can become almost archaeological.

The building starts telling you what happened to it.

Old and New Don't Have to Pretend to Be the Same

I don't believe every addition to an old building needs fake historic trim applied to it so people think it was built 100 years ago.

Sometimes that actually diminishes the historic building.

I would rather understand what is original and what belongs to the next chapter.

Materials can relate.

Proportions can relate.

Window rhythms can relate.

Scale can relate.

A cornice line can influence a new addition without literally copying the cornice.

A modern material can sit next to historic brick.

And when it is done carefully, the contrast can actually make you appreciate the original architecture more.

The new work becomes a frame for the old.

Preservation Isn't Only About Individual Buildings

It is also about streets.

Blocks.

Views.

Storefronts.

Sidewalks.

Trees.

Alleys.

The relationship between buildings and the public realm.

One old building disappears and maybe it doesn't seem like a big deal.

Then another disappears.

Then another.

Eventually you drive down the same street and realize you can't quite explain it, but the place doesn't feel the same anymore.

No single demolition caused it.

It happened incrementally.

That's one of the challenges with preservation.

A building belongs to a property owner.

But collectively, buildings create the identity of an entire community.

At Some Point, Cost Can't Be the Only Question

If cost were the only thing that mattered, we would lose an incredible amount of architecture.

Imagine looking at the Colosseum in Rome and saying:

This thing is old, inefficient, deteriorating and expensive to maintain. The land is probably worth a fortune. Let's knock it down and put a shopping mall here.

Or looking at the Parthenon and deciding that maintaining a 2,400-year-old stone structure just doesn't pencil out anymore.

It sounds ridiculous.

Of course it does.

Because we already decided those places have value beyond the cost of the material sitting there.

They hold history.

They represent craftsmanship.

They tell us something about the people who built them and the civilizations that came before us.

Now obviously, I'm not comparing every old commercial building in Helena to the Parthenon or the Colosseum.

That would be a little dramatic.

But the underlying question is the same.

At what point do we recognize that a building has value beyond what it costs to replace it?

The problem is that it's easy to recognize that value after something has become internationally famous.

It's harder when you're looking at an aging brick building in your own town with a leaking roof, outdated wiring and a structural problem.

That's when the decision actually matters.

Because once it is demolished, the conversation is over.

You can build something new.

You can build something beautiful.

You can even build something inspired by what was there.

But you cannot build the original building again.

But Cities Still Have to Change

Preservation can't mean that Helena, or any city, stops evolving.

We need housing.

We need businesses.

We need accessible buildings.

We need buildings that use less energy.

We need spaces that accommodate modern life.

And there are old buildings that may simply not justify extraordinary efforts to save them.

Every old building isn't automatically historic.

But every old building probably deserves to be understood before we decide it has nothing left to offer.

Sometimes the right answer is restoration.

Sometimes it is adaptive reuse.

Sometimes it is a contemporary addition.

Sometimes it is retaining only portions of the building.

Sometimes it is finding a structural solution nobody considered initially.

And yes, sometimes demolition is the appropriate answer.

Architecture rarely gives us one rule that works everywhere.

What Are We Actually Trying to Preserve?

I think that is the most important question.

Are we preserving a wall?

A building?

A material?

A façade?

A streetscape?

Craftsmanship?

A memory?

The identity of a neighborhood?

Because historic preservation isn't really about refusing to change.

It is about understanding what has value before we change it.

There are buildings all over Helena that were created during a period when architecture carried an incredible amount of craftsmanship and civic pride.

We may never build some of those details the same way again.

That doesn't mean every one of those buildings needs to become a museum.

Actually, I think the opposite.

The best thing we can do for many historic buildings is figure out how to make them useful again.

Give them housing.

Give them businesses.

Give them new structure when they need it.

Make them accessible.

Make them safer.

Put people back inside them.

And let architects, engineers, builders, craftspeople and owners get creative about how we do it.

Because preservation doesn't have to mean choosing the past instead of the future.

Sometimes the most interesting architecture comes from figuring out how to have both.

Michael Demetrios Frudakis, AIA, NCARB
Principal Architect