Calvin Nguyen Awarded the 2023 Tompkins Fellowship

by SAH News | Apr 04, 2023

Calvin NguyenThe Society of Architectural Historians is pleased to name Calvin Nguyen, a graduate student at the University of Pennsylvania, as the 2023 HABS-SAH Sally Kress Tompkins Fellow. The Sally Kress Tompkins Fellowship, a joint program of SAH and the National Park Service’s Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS), permits a graduate student in architectural history or a related field the opportunity to work on a 12-week HABS history project. Nguyen's fellowship project will focus on Los Angeles’s Chinatown.

Nguyen will graduate from the University of Pennsylvania’s Historic Preservation, MSHP program in spring 2023 with a concentration on public history in the built environment. He completed his master’s thesis on Philadelphia’s Little Saigon neighborhood and the relationships between its built environment and Vietnamese American heritage. Nguyen received his BA in American Studies from University of California, Berkeley. His research interests include ethnic vernacular built environments, commercial architecture, public spaces, sites of public memory, and heritage tourism. Through his work he seeks to both highlight the significance of the built environment to identity-making, public memory, and community, as well as employ preservation strategies to serve current communities and their needs. Though he is currently seeking a role in preservation practice, Nguyen plans to pursue a PhD in architectural history in the future.




Founded in 1940, the Society of Architectural Historians is an international nonprofit membership organization that promotes the study, interpretation and conservation of architecture, design, landscapes and urbanism worldwide. SAH serves a network of local, national and international institutions and individuals who, by profession or interest, focus on the built environment and its role in shaping contemporary life. SAH promotes meaningful public engagement with the history of the built environment through advocacy efforts, print and online publications, and local, national and international programs.
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