Your support for our virtual lectures is appreciated

The Preservation Society continues to serve its educational mission by hosting virtual lectures featuring renowned historians, authors, and curators via online video conference. From April 30 until November 19, we hosted 17 virtual lectures.

Our virtual Winter Lecture Series will present a variety of programs from January 28 through March 25.

These lectures are free and registration is open to the public. In order for us to continue these offerings, your support is critical. Please consider making a donation to the Preservation Society by clicking the donation button above. Any amount is greatly appreciated and we are thankful for your continued support. 

To view past Virtual Lectures, click here

2021 Winter Lecture Series

Americans in Paris: Foundations of America’s Architectural Gilded Age

Margot Ellis, Architectural Historian
Thursday, March 11, 5:30 p.m. ET (Zoom Webinar)

Americans in Paris tells the story of the influential group of American architecture students who attended the world-renowned École des Beaux-Arts and went on to design and build many of our nation’s most recognized and prestigious buildings and monuments. American alumni of the École des Beaux-Arts, famous for being the world’s greatest art and architecture school at the time, include Richard Morris Hunt, Guy Lowell, John Russell Pope, Julia Morgan, Julian Abele, and many others.

Margot M. Ellis was educated at Manhattanville College, where she received a bachelor’s degree in French Studies, and at Harvard University, where she received a master’s degree in Anthropology. Hired as a research assistant by Jean-Paul Carlhian, Miss Ellis spent 15 years completing the manuscript of Americans in Paris and brought it to publication after the death of Mr. Carlhian in 2012. Following its publication by Rizzoli International in September 2014, Miss Ellis spent four years lecturing courtesy of ICAA (Institute of Classical Architecture & Art), among others. ICAA is co-publisher through its Classical America series. She lectured for 13 of its 16 chapters nationwide as well as presenting in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. Miss Ellis is an author and editor based in Tucson, Arizona.

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Virtual Tour of the Lobkowicz Palace Collections, Prague

William Rudolf Lobkowicz
Thursday, March 25, 12 p.m. ET (Zoom Webinar)

IMPORTANT NOTE: This tour is only available to view live. It will not be saved on YouTube.

DESCRIPTION OF TOUR: Once one of Bohemia’s most prominent noble families, the Lobkowiczes were forced to flee their homeland twice under both the Nazi and Communist regimes. Join William Rudolf Lobkowicz on a personal tour of Lobkowicz Palace to find out how the family returned to its native country to reclaim its confiscated possessions, with the mission to preserve, study, and share them with the world. Mr. Lobkowicz will lead you through the Lobkowicz Collections, which feature world-famous paintings by Canaletto, Bruegel, and Velázquez, as well as hand-annotated manuscripts by Mozart and Beethoven. The tour will conclude with a 15-minute Q&A, when attendees will have the opportunity to write in questions for Mr. Lobkowicz to answer.

William Rudolf Lobkowicz was raised in the Czech Republic and has been actively involved in his family’s cultural heritage efforts around the Lobkowicz Collections and historic properties since childhood. After graduating from the International School of Prague, he attended Harvard University, receiving his BA in Central European History in 2018. After graduating, Mr. Lobkowicz returned to the Czech Republic to continue working with his family’s enterprises. His work involves digitization efforts, marketing, media, online platforms and public programming. One of his main goals is to find new and innovative ways to share the family’s collections and nonprofit activities with the world.

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Leslie B. Jones, Director of Museum of Affairs and Chief Curator, The Preservation Society of Newport County
Thursday, March 25, 5:30 p.m. ET (Zoom Webinar) 

Following the end of the Gilded Age, circa 1900, the built environment of America’s wealthy took a turn into a new age of architecture. The American Country Place Era was a subtle yet definable shift as wealth expanded across the nation, cities grew, and industry boomed, resulting in major home building projects distinguished by a proclivity for historical revival styles in structural architecture and complimentary landscape architecture designs. Leslie Jones will discuss various examples of this Gilded Age bookend, illustrating edifices from Massachusetts to Tennessee.

Leslie Jones has been the Director of Museum Affairs and Chief Curator for the Preservation Society since April 2019. Prior to this role, she has consulted with various historical sites across the country and served as the Director of Museum Affairs and Curator of Decorative Arts at Cheekwood (Nashville) and the Curator and Director of Historical Resources and Programming at the White House Historical Association (D.C.).

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