Celebrating the thirtieth anniversary of the Preserving the Recent Past conference series, PRP 4 will provide a new forum to share the latest strategies for identifying, protecting and conserving significant structures and sites from the post-World War II era. Since the inception of Preserving the Recent Past in 1995, a variety of resources have reached fifty years of age. Innovation continues in the treatment of postwar materials while new survey techniques for populated landscapes have emerged. Preserving the Recent Past 4 will highlight buildings and sites from this period. These spaces tell stories of multiple and successive modern styles, innovative products and new social activist movements.

Preserving the Recent Past 4 has been co-organized by Historic Preservation Education Foundation and the Boston Architectural College. Public and private stakeholders are invited from across the spectrum of preservation, non-profit and development. The conference will feature three tracks of concurrent presentation sessions, plenary talks, workshops and tours. Preserving the Recent Past 4 will build upon the groundbreaking work of its prior conferences, highlighting features such as a highly anticipated talk from Docomomo US’ Hannah Simonson on San Francisco’s New Modernism and a “Documenting the Recent Past” workshop with The National Park Service’s Heritage Documentation Program and the Historic Preservation Education Foundation.