Laura Blokker and Andrew Liles
2020 Richard L. Blinder Award
Transformative Preservation: Reclaiming African American Spaces Left Behind by School Desegregation
Across the state of Louisiana – as in other Southern states – sit many long-vacant school plants that tell the story of African American education in the first half of the twentieth century. Today, alumni are seeking to save these once thriving educational facilities and adaptively reuse them for the future of their communities. This project catalogued and analyzed the standing mid-century African American school campuses in Louisiana and developed a guide book for their preservation and rehabilitation.
View the final report HERE.
https://www.africanamericanschoolbuildingrevival.com/
Image: St. Matthew High School, Melrose, Louisiana