With more than lOO active projects in its current operating portfolio, WM F could easily rest on its laurels, proud of the extraordinary progress that is being made to save world treasures such as Angkor in Cambodia, the Lodge of Retirement in China's Forbidden City, Catherine the Great's...Read more
I first came in contact with the International Fund for Monuments—as it was then called—in Venice. The great flood of November 3–5, 1966 was still a recent and terrible memory. The waters had risen to well over two meters above their normal level and had remained there for more than 24 hours,...Read more
Seldom are new discoveries made in the course of an otherwise routine restoration project. Yet that is precisely what has happened within a small jewel box of a chapel on the grounds of the great Abbey of Chaalis, 50 kilometers northeast of Paris. There, architects and restorers working to salvage...Read more
Amid Rome’s often dizzying chaos, the “Cimitero Acattolico” or Cemetery for Non-Catholics in Testaccio is a particularly tranquil spot. At the top of the hill, near the grave of poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, the scents of pine needles and jasmine flowers intertwine to perfume the air which is...Read more
It has been more than four decades since WM F began leaving its indelible mark on the field of historic preservation and in that time, hundreds of sites have passed through our portfolio—some on the brink of collapse, others needing only an influential friend to champion their cause. But we have...Read more
Dorothy “Dot” Phillips, a 76-year-old resident of Bay St. Louis, Mis - sissippi, is the consummate hostess, even while entertaining in a place that is not, strictly speaking, her home. On a fiercely hot June afternoon she’s serving coffee and cookies to a small group that includes Marty Hylton, the...Read more
The Jewish Heritage Program was launched by World Monuments Fund in 1988 to draw attention to Jewish cultural heritage under threat as a result of the Jewish Diaspora and the inability of smaller communities to care for their sacred and secular sites. This publication describes WMF’s...Read more
A s one of the world’s oldest civilizations, India has been influenced over the centuries by cultures from around the globe. From the Roman remains in Arikameddu to the Mughal architecture of the sixteenth-century Emperor Akbar and the distinctive urbanism of French, British, and Portuguese...Read more
A soaring plane, a surging ship, a swirling staircase. Disconnected as they may seem, these elements all come together in Asmara, capital of Africa’s newest country Eritrea, in a veritable Aladdin’s Cave of architectural riches. The symbolism characterizes the eclectic buildings of this...Read more
The soft glow of butter lamps illuminates Lama Tsering as he blesses a bundle of prayer flags, aspersing them with rose water and grains of white rice. Clad in a saffron robe and enveloped in a cloud of juniper incense, he prays for the success of our mission, his rhythmic chant punctuated by the...Read more