The Architectural League History Project
We are working to document and analyze the League’s nearly-150 years of history, and we need your help to do it.
The Project
In order to preserve, contextualize, and interrogate its past (for a fuller history, see our history page here), The Architectural League has embarked on a multi-year, three-part history project that will result in the publication of a critical scholarly history of the institution on the occasion of the League’s 150th anniversary in 2031.
At a time when formal architectural education in the United States was still rare, the 1881 establishment of The Architectural League of New York—a voluntary association for “the purposes… of architectural study”—was an acknowledgement on the part of young architects that if they were to grow creatively and intellectually, they would need to build the environment in which to do so themselves.
Over the course of more than 140 years, that spirit of mutual education has remained constant. Indeed, it is what drives the League today in its mission to support critically transformative work in the allied fields that shape the built environment, stimulating the thinking, debate, and action necessary to confront today’s converging crises of racism, inequity, and climate change in service of a more livable and just world. The architects, artists, engineers, planners, landscape architects, designers, and others who currently define the League’s programs are as motivated by a desire to improve themselves and the practice of architecture as the 26 young architects who decided to organize themselves on that winter day in 1881.
Three-Phase Plan for the History Project
The first phase of the project is dedicated to the organization and permanent housing of the League’s post-1974 archive. (Much of the pre-1974 archive is held at the Archives of American Art.) Total holdings consist of roughly 250 boxes of physical documents and several thousand digital files. The League also plans to digitize our large collection of aging audio and video recordings of programs dating back to 1974.
We are simultaneously in the process of collecting and creating a repository of oral histories of individuals who have significantly contributed to the League’s work. Our goal is to create an archive of professionally recorded and edited video interviews, to be housed within the League’s archival collection. Initial interviewees include Emilio Ambasz, Jonathan Barnett, Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel, Barbara Jakobson, John Lobell, Deborah Nevins, Suzanne Stephens, Robert A.M. Stern, and Susana Torre. The project will conclude with a critical history published on the occasion of the League’s 150th anniversary, in 2031.
History Committee
The project is overseen by a committee of distinguished members of the New York architecture, design, and historic preservation communities: Teri Harris, Rosalie Genevro, Leslie Gill, Frances Halsband, Paul Lewis, Anne Rieselbach, Karen Stein, Suzanne Stephens, Robert A.M. Stern, and Gregory Wessner; and is managed by the League’s Director of Research and Operations, William Kelly, PhD.
Need
We expect expenses for this multi-part, multimedia project to total approximately $300,000.
To Give
To make a gift use our contribution form and select “History Project” in the “Area of Support” field. You may choose to make a one-time or recurring contribution to sustain our efforts to preserve the League’s rich legacy. Contributions will be processed by The Architectural League of New York, and are tax deductible to the full extent of the law (Federal Tax ID: 13-1671027).
If you prefer to donate by check or other means and for additional information about supporting this special project, please contact:
Cameron King
Director of Development and Communications
The Architectural League of New York
king@archleague.org
William Kelly
Director of Research and Operations
The Architectural League of New York
kelly@archleague.org
From the Archive
Women in American Architecture: A Historic and Contemporary Perspective, an exhibition curated by architect Susana Torre and sponsored by the Architectural League of New York, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the New York State Council on the Arts, opened at the Brooklyn Museum on February 24th, 1977. This groundbreaking event was the first major exhibition about the history of the influence of women in the field of architecture. It was created in September 1973 as a result of the efforts of a group of women and The Architectural League to develop the first national archive about women in architecture in the United States.
The archive was conceived as a resource of public interest for journalists, students, writers, and architects, and as a means to raise awareness of women’s roles in architecture. Those who undertook the archival project solicited original work from over 2,500 women architects across the United States. Their goal was to illuminate the contributions of both historical and contemporary women architects from diverse backgrounds, and to reshape the narrative of architectural history—traditionally told from a male perspective—by making space for voices that had long been overlooked. It was thus a natural progression to translate this research into an exhibition format, to bring greater visibility to these contributions. The exhibition sought to present previously unknown projects of significant historical and social value, tracing women’s access to the profession from the late 19th century onward. The exhibition paired biographies and projects from various women selected from the archive to shed light on the unrecognized history of women in architecture, one with individuals from the past and present.
This document, found in the League’s archives, outlines the exhibition’s initial goals and curatorial approach and refers to the project by its original name of Dwelling, Place and Architecture: An Exhibition of Spaces, Projects and Buildings Designed by Women. Although this initial document identifies three main sections for the exhibition—The American Woman’s Home, A Century of Women in Architecture, and Changing Spaces—the final exhibition was restructured into three overarching themes: practitioners and critics, reformers of the domestic sphere, and the Woman’s Building. This document details the curatorial framework, the preliminary selection of works, and the strategic organization of the exhibition. It offers crucial insight into a project that was the result of years of largely voluntary labor, driven by a collective effort among women in architecture to gain recognition and assert their rightful place in the profession’s history.
