Save the date! It’s time for our annual Preservation Awards.
Each year, the Cambridge Historical Commission honors projects and individuals that have made outstanding contributions to protect the city’s historic character and built environment. The 2024-25 Preservation Awards will recognize projects completed between January and December 2024.
This year, the awards ceremony takes place both in person and on Zoom on Thursday, June 12th. The in-person reception will be held in the City Hall Sullivan Chamber at 795 Massachusetts Ave in Central Square, Cambridge. Light refreshments will be served beginning at 5:30pm followed by an engaging presentation showcasing each project with an introduction of project principals. This event is free and open to the public.
Please RSVP for the in-person event via email to our Assistant Director Kit Rawlins at krawlins[at]cambridgema.gov. If you would like to watch the program on Zoom, register here: https://tinyurl.com/CHCAwards2025. We hope to see you there!
For questions, call our office at 617.349.4683 or email histcomm[at]cambridgema.gov
Together with hundreds of other Jane’s Walks simultaneously worldwide, our walk will honor Jane Jacobs, the urban visionary and author of Death and Life of Great American Cities.
View west from intersection of Concord Ave and present-day Bond St showing Astronomical Observatory and St. Peter’s Church (detail; originally published in Gleason’s Pictorial, 1851)
Join us this Saturday May 10th from 10-11:30am as we explore “The Complex Layering of a Cambridge Neighborhood.” This walk will explore the summit and backslope of Observatory Hill, where many modest workers’ houses have been or are being transformed into luxury homes. Charles Sullivan, Executive Director of the Cambridge Historical Commission, will guide us through this fascinating tour, a “walking conversation.”
135 Garden St: Preservation Award-winning renovation of former candy factory, now a residence
We will begin and end in front of St. Peter’s Church, at 100 Concord Ave, opposite the rear of the Harvard Observatory.
Built in 1847, as Cambridge’s second Catholic church, St. Peter’s aimed to accommodate the large influx of Irish immigrants in the 1840s. We will walk by a variety of brickyard laborers’ cottages, many of which have been dramatically altered with contemporary designs.
21 Kelley St: Renovated worker’s cottage
More recent houses now sit on long-depleted claypits. A wayward California bungalow is tucked behind a Greek Revival domicile on Garden Street, adjacent to an early 20th century planned Garden City-style neighborhood meant as a bulwark against spreading three-deckers.
97 Garden St: blueprint section showing studio and residence of noted artist and former architect George T. Plowman
Post-World War II veterans’ housing occupies Harvard’s former Botanic Garden, across the street from the home of famed botanist Asa Gray. Today, residents are concerned that these historical layers may soon disappear.
88 Garden St: view of Asa Gray House in its original location on the grounds of the Harvard College Botanical Gardens
This tour is free, open to one and all, and will occur rain or shine. RSVP is appreciated but not required. Contact Glenna Lang with any questions or RSVPs: lang.glenna[at]gmail.com.
113 Garden St: Architect’s rendering of the Taylor Square Fire Station
