HDP Announces Peterson Prize Winners
The Heritage Documentation Programs (Historic American Buildings Survey / Historic American Engineering Record / Historic American Landscapes Survey), a division of the National Park Service, is pleased to announce the winners of the 2023 Charles E. Peterson Prize Competition.
A student competition of measured drawings, the Charles E. Peterson Prize is presented jointly by HDP, the Athenaeum of Philadelphia, the American Institute of Architects, and the Association for Preservation Technology. The annual competition, currently in its 40th year, honors Charles E. Peterson, FAIA (1906-2004), a founder of the HABS program, and is intended to heighten awareness about historic buildings in the United States and to augment the HABS/HAER/HALS collection of measured drawings at the Library of Congress. In addition to generating over 7,200 sheets of drawings for the collection to date, the competition presents awards totaling $21,000 to the winning student teams.
First Place in the 2023 Competition was awarded to the student team from Ball State University, under the direction of Professor Jonathan Spodek, FAIA, for their documentation of the Jefferson Helm House, an 1845 Greek Revival house near Rushville, Indiana.
The student team at the University of Texas at San Antonio, under the direction of Professor Sue Ann Pemberton, FAIA, was awarded Second Place for their drawings of the Garden Room (1940) at Frank Lloyd Wright's Taliesin West in Scottsdale, Arizona.
Two teams tied for Third Place. The student team from the University of Miami, under the direction of Ricardo Lopez, for their drawings of the Coral Gables Congregational Church, completed in 1925 in the Spanish Revival style and the student team from Clemson University, under the direction of Professor Amalia Leifeste, AIA, for their drawings of Saint James Protestant Episcopal Church in Goose Creek, South Carolina, constructed 1713-19.
A list of the student members for the winning teams can be found on the HDP website at
Sample drawings from the winning projects can be found on the HDP Facebook page at Facebook.
The student teams will be honored in a ceremony at the Athenaeum of Philadelphia, as part of a special two-day symposium, November 10-11, commemorating the 40th anniversary of the Peterson Prize and the 90th anniversary of the establishment of the HABS program. To register for the symposium, please visit: Event – Detail – The Athenæum of Philadelphia (philaathenaeum.org)
Congratulations to all the winners!