George Smart on Why Documentation Is Such a Powerful Preservation Tool


Paschal House, Raleigh, NC, designed by James Fitzgibbons, destroyed 2013. Image © George Smart

Paschal House, Raleigh, NC, designed by James Fitzgibbons, destroyed 2013. Image © George Smart

This article was originally published on Common Edge.

George Smart is an unlikely preservationist, almost an accidental one. The founder and executive director of USModernist, a nonprofit dedicated to the preservation and documentation of modern houses, Smart worked for 30 years as a management consultant. “I was doing strategic planning and organization training,” he says. “My wife refers to this whole other project as a 16-year seizure.” Recently I spoke with Smart about his two websites, the podcast, the house tours his organization conducts, and why documentation is such a power preservation tool.

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