2024 Docomomo US National Symposium
May 29 - June 1, 2024
Miami and Coral Gables, Florida
Join us in Miami and Coral Gables, Florida, from May 29 to June 1, 2024, and experience one of the country’s richest collections of mid-century and postmodern architecture. Entitled Streams of Modernity: Postwar to Postmodern, the 2024 National Symposium is a collaboration of Docomomo US and the Docomomo US/Florida chapter.
Miami is a city whose location, diversity and vibrant growth have made it an ideal destination for international travel, business, culture, and leisure. Incorporated in 1896 - though Native Americans inhabited the region for millennia - the city and its greater region are a remarkable landscape described by native Amerindians as a slowly flowing “river of grass,” with a thin strip of buildable land stretching along its coastline. The region became an escape for post-World War II middle America, shaped largely by the desire for leisure and entertainment. Over the past decades, Miami has become a laboratory to explore new urban patterns, building types, evolving aesthetics, and emerging environmental consciousness.
The symposium seeks to promote a broader understanding of the accomplishments of postwar to Postmodern architecture and culture in regionally specific contexts such as South Florida, the Caribbean, and Latin America. Themes to be explored include: Tropical Brutalism, Postwar campus planning in the (sub)tropics, LGBTQ+Modernism, Postwar tourism, urban renewal and Interstate infrastructure, Modern architecture and popular culture in south Florida, polychrome Modern & the integration of the arts, and more.
Sign up for the Docomomo US newsletter to receive National Symposium news and updates.
Call for Abstracts
The Call for Abstracts is now open. Submissions are due January 11, 2024.
Researchers, practitioners, and enthusiasts involved in the process of preservation, conservation, renovation or transformation of buildings, sites and neighborhoods of the Modern Movement are invited to submit abstracts that align with the stated thematic goals. Topics outside of the suggested areas will also be considered. We welcome submissions that take a holistic approach to Modern resources and consider the social context, technical merits, aesthetics, and settings when evaluating them. Abstracts should include how the subject contributes to the broader discussion of diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice, either generally or in relation to a specific field of study.
Please review the instructions carefully before submitting, and reach out to symposium@docomomo-us.org with any questions.