Combining the Old with the New

Restoration, Preservation. Renovation. Rehabilitation. Remodeling. I touched on these terms in the introduction, so you know they don't all mean the same thing. But let's consider some formal definitions, according to the Standards of the Secre­tary of the Interior, under whose auspices are the National Park Service, the Preser­vation Assistance Division, and the Historic American Buildings Survey:

PRESERVATION.
"The act or process of applying measures to sustain the existing form, integrity, and material of a building or structure, and the existing form and veg­etative cover of a site. It may include stabilization work, where necessary, as well as ongoing maintenance of the historic building material." Loosely translated? The task is to save—to preserve—the existing bits and pieces (fabric) that survive from ear­lier eras.

RESTORATION.
"The act or process of accurately recovering the form and details of a property and its setting as it appeared at a particular period of time by means of the removal of later work or by the replacement of missing earlier work." In other words, the restorer turns back the clock and attempts to replicate what was origi­nally in place but subsequently removed or destroyed.