Architecture News

World Monuments Fund Spotlights Threatened Historic Sites

2022 World Monuments Watch includes 25 buildings and landscapes around the world

By Ilana Herzig

**Teotihuacán Archaeological Park**. View of the site's pyramids from a hot air balloon in San Juan Teotihuacán, Mexico. The park has been selected for inclusive tourism planning and visitor management to help address economic challenges facing surrounding communities. Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund

**Mosque City of Bagerhat.** The Sixty Dome Mosque also known as the Shait Gumbad Mosque and Shat Gambuj Mosque in Bagerhat, Bangladesh. The religious landscape of ancient Khalifatabad requires climate adaptation. Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund

**Sumba Island.** Sacred houses of the Praingu Matualang Village in Indonesia. The homes will be lost without community-led training in the traditional knowledge necessary to maintain these structures. Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund

**Tiretta Bazaar.** The Chinese New Year celebrations at Tiretta Bazaar in Kolkata, India. The country's earliest Chinatown is home to minority communities seeking recognition for their history and urban revitalization. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

**Heritage Buildings of Beirut.** A French-mandate building in the upper part of the Fouad Boutros corridor after the blast in Beirut, Lebanon. The vibrant coastal city devastated by the blast of August 2020, needs further recovery support to protect and rehabilitate the historic buildings. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

**Benghazi Historic City Center.** The Silphium Plaza in Benghazi, Libya after war. The revival of an important public square in war-ravaged area can catalyze recovery efforts and serve as a symbol of community-driven urban resilience. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

**Koagannu Mosques and Cemetery.** The historic waterfront cemetery in the Maldives has distinct coral-stone architecture that is threatened by rapidly rising seas. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

**Hitis (Water Fountains) of the Kathmandu Valley.** A functioning stone carved Hiti in Nepal. The extensive system of historic water distribution points and underground channels needs maintenance to ensure reliable access to clean water. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

**Tomb of Jahangi.** The Sikri red sandstone with white marble inlay of the western facade of the Tomb of Jahangir in Lahore, Pakistan. The only imperial Mughal tomb in country requires restoration to foster new visitation and provide invaluable greenspace. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

**Kinchela Aboriginal Boys Training Home.** A dormitory at the training home in Kinchela, Australia. The survivor-led effort seeks to transform a former government institution for Aboriginal boys forcibly taken from their families into a place of truth-telling and healing. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

**Yanacancha-Huaquis Cultural Landscape.** The landscape's Wetland in Miraflores District, Peru. Ancient pre-Inca water management systems and sustainable tourism planning are crucial for an Andean community to adapt to climate change and provide local economic benefit. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

**Lamanai, Indian Church Village**. The Mask Temple at Lamanai in Belize. The international tourist destination encompassing an ancient Maya city requires a more inclusive management to reinforce the relationship between the site and locals. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

**Alcântara and Rocha do Conde de Óbidos Marine Stations (Almada Negreiros Murals).** Gare Marítima de Alcântara Noble Hall in Lisbon, Portugal. Mid-century murals by Afro-Portuguese artist José de Almada Negreiros require conservation to promote underrepresented narratives and serve as a catalyst for port revitalization. *Photo © Port of Lisbon*

**Fabric Synagogue and Jewish Heritage of Timișoara.** Fabric Synagogue interior in Romania. Cultural mapping and restoration of a grand synagogue can bring renewed visibility to Jewish heritage and promote local cohesion in western Romania. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

**Nuri Royal Pyramids.** Naptan King Aspelta's pyramid of Nuri, Sudan. The ancient kingdom of Kush's pyramids are threatened by environmental factors require renewed management strategies and conservation. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

**Africatown.** A historic Alabama community established by formerly enslaved Africans in Mobile, Alabama, United States. The community is seeking support to leverage a recent archaeological discovery to protect their homes and call for environmental justice. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

**Garcia Pasture: the traditional territory of the Carrizo/Comecrudo Tribe.** A local parade in in Brownsville, Texas, United States. The area is threatened by natural resource extraction and desecration of ancestral lands. *Photo courtesy of World Monuments Fund*

**Soqotra Archipelago**. Dragon blood tree at Diksam in Soqotra Archipelago, Yemen. The Soqotri people seek to protect and promote their identity through cultural mapping and inventory of their rich heritage across the region. *Photograph © Chris Miller*

**Monte Alegre State Park.** The main panel of rock paintings from the Serra da Lua site in Brazil. Prehistoric cave paintings in the Amazon are threatened by environmental degradation. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

**La Maison du Peuple.** The important landmark in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso is a unique example of African modernism and requires rehabilitation. Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund

**Cultural Landscape of the Bunong People.** Bunong villagers from Bu Cheeng in Mondulkiri Province, Cambodia calling the spirits in front of their altar filled with gifts as part of the wer-brii-wer-nam ritual. Mapping and documentation can support the struggle to protect ancestral land from agro-industrial development and encroachment. Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund

**Fortified Manors of Yongtai.** Fortified family homes in the remote Fujian Province of southeast China present an opportunity for rural revitalization, community-led environmental management, and sustainable tourism. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

**Abydos.** The processional entry steps of the Seti I Temple at Abydos, Egypt. Tourism and encroachment at one of Ancient Egypt’s most important sites require expertise and planning to support sustainable preservation. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

**Hurst Castle.** The fortress built by Henry VIII in Hampshire, United Kingdom. After decades of exposure to coastal erosion, the eastern gun battery partially collapsed in February 2021, and illustrates the impact of climate change on the coast's heritage. *Photo © ExploringWithin on YouTube*

**Asante Traditional Buildings.** Tano Kwadwo Shrine, one of ten remaining examples of Asante traditional shrines in Ghana. Sacred earthen shrines, among the last architectural vestiges of the Kingdom of Asante, face ongoing deterioration. *Photo courtesy World Monuments Fund*

On Tuesday, the World Monuments Fund (WMF) announced the 2022 World Monuments Watch, a selection of 25 heritage sites “of extraordinary cultural significance” whose preservation has been deemed both “urgent and vital to local communities” across 24 countries, according to a WMF press release. The Watch, released biannually, includes sites around the world that are selected by the International Council on Monuments and Sites alongside a panel of heritage experts. The list is intended to bring global awareness to preservation efforts and spotlight the impact of socio-political pressures on heritage sites; categorized into four broad categories—climate change, underrepresented heritage, imbalanced tourism, and crisis recovery—the 2022 sites span 12,000 years of history.

“This year’s Watch demonstrates that heritage preservation can offer innovative solutions to contemporary global challenges,” said World Monuments Fund president and CEO Bénédicte de Montlaur in a statement.

In recent years, the organization has shifted its focus from individual buildings to a broader definition of historic sites. Reflecting a larger trend in preservation, the WMF has also endeavored to make its selection more global and inclusive. In the climate change category, coastal locations like the Maldives’s Koagannu Mosques and Cemetery face sea level rise, while Nepal’s Hitis (Water Fountains) of the Kathmandu Valley and Peru’s Yanacancha-Huaquis Cultural Landscape must contend with the issue of water scarcity. Often at risk for exploitation, destruction, and resource extraction, underrepresented ancestral territories like Australia’s Kinchela Aboriginal Boys Training Home and the U.S.’s Garcia Pasture—the territory of the Carrizo/Comecrudo Tribe of Texas—are home to those advocating for protection through local stewardship.

An imbalance of tourism reverberates through sites like Mexico’s archaeological park Teotihuacán, where local residents don’t see the economic benefits wrought from visibility and tourism; whereas China’s Fortified Manors of Yongtai and Egypt’s Abydos represent under-visited locations ripe for sustainable tourism. Crisis-impacted sites in need of community-led recovery include Lebanon’s Heritage Buildings of Beirut decimated in the 2020 explosion and Benghazi’s Historic Center in Libya.

“We urge the world to stand with communities and save these places of extraordinary cultural significance,” said de Montlaur. “Heritage sites are an incredible resource for addressing larger issues facing society as well as local needs of recognition, access, participation, and economic opportunity.”

Since creating the Watch in 1996, the WMF has put more than $110 million toward preserving 300 watch sites. In addition to carrying out emergency conservation efforts during crises, the WMF funds projects, provides grants, carries out scientific research, and develops preservation training programs with local communities to arrange for long-term stewardship of identified heritage sites.

KEYWORDS: historic preservation

Ilana Herzig, a former Associate Editor at Architectural Record, is a Brooklyn-based writer from California. Her writing has appeared in The Brooklyn Rail, The Los Angeles Times, Hyperallergic, & Artsy among others. Ilana holds a B.A. from Northwestern University and a masters from Columbia Journalism School.