In Shakespeare’s The Tempest (a play which, incidentally, opens with a violent storm),  a character utters the line, “What’s past is prologue.” In contemporary use, that phrase has come to mean that the past sets the stage for the present and actively shapes the future. There’s a common misconception that historical preservation, particularly when it comes to architecture, is about freezing things in time. In reality, the more we understand about architecture and how it interacts with its environment over time, the better we can adapt going forward. Architecture Sarasota has made it a mission to honor and preserve Sarasota’s rich architectural history while creating programs to ensure the city and its structures have a more resilient future.

Morris “Marty” Hylton III is the President of Architecture Sarasota. He grew up in a small river town in the Cumberland Mountains called Pikeville, Kentucky that was prone to flooding. A man named William Hambley had the idea to move the river by cutting through the mountains, a project that took place over a fourteen-year timespan during Hylton’s formative years.

“I am from a place that moved a mountain to make itself more resilient,” Hylton says. “This certainly influenced my interest in climate resilience.” An architect by training, Hylton’s primary area of focus is mid-twentieth-century cultural heritage (particularly modern buildings) with an additional research track in disaster recovery. He oversaw a recovery program on the Mississippi Gulf Coast and New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina which was the beginning of his work in recovery from large-scale natural disasters. He spent 14 years at the University of Florida as research faculty and Director of Historic Preservation before becoming the inaugural Historic Architect for Climate Change for the National Park Service's Climate Change Response Program. There, he helped create the Climate, Science, and Disaster Response Program before taking his current position at Architecture Sarasota.

Architecture Sarasota is a nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving and promoting the legacy of the Sarasota School of Architecture, a regional postwar modern architectural movement that emerged in the area between 1941 and 1966. Characterized by clean lines, open spaces and a strong connection to the natural environment, the style adapted modernist principles to the region’s climate by incorporating features like large overhangs and glass panels as well as strategies like passive design which utilizes natural resources to heat and cool buildings. 

“Our mission is to steward the legacy of the Sarasota School, so part of that is the physical conservation and preservation of artifacts,” Hylton says. “But more importantly, our role is the keeper of the flame of those values and principles, and they’re as relevant today as they ever were.” In support of that mission, Architecture Sarasota curated the Moderns That Matter list of one hundred places and spaces that give Sarasota its unique sense of character. The organization has also offered walking tours of some of the iconic homes on the Moderns That Matter list, though that has been pared back in the wake of last year's back-to-back hurricanes Helene and Milton which damaged two out of the three featured homes. They weren’t the only historic structures in the area to take on damage. This is where Hylton’s background in disaster recovery has been vital, leading to Architecture Sarasota’s new program Restoring a Sense of Place. The organization has stepped up in the immediate aftermath to assist residents and local organizations with the documentation, assessment and recovery of significant sites and buildings damaged by high winds and flooding. 

“To date, Architecture Sarasota has helped assess about 32 architecturally and culturally significant historic properties on Siesta Key, St. Armands and Lido Key, Longboat Key and Anna Maria Island. Primarily, but not all private residences,” Hylton says. “We have digitally documented—using terrestrial LiDAR (laser scanning) and drone imaging—six properties and have at least three others scheduled. In most instances, the information from this documentation will be used to assist with recovery and adaptation of these sites. With a few examples, we are digitally documenting to mitigate the loss of properties that will be demolished. I would really like to give credit to the two architecture firms that are providing pro-bono support for the digital documentation—Sweet Sparkman Architecture and Interiors (local) and MCWB Architects (based in New York).”

During this process, Hylton discovered hidden gems that even he hadn’t known about. A local resident (who, speaking of interesting historical details, was a producer on Sesame Street in the 1970s) reached out after the storms. His Longboat Key home, built circa 1960, was designed by the father-son team of Ralph and William Zimmerman, two prominent architects in the Sarasota School of Architecture. It is one of seven properties Architecture Sarasota will be nominating for the National Register of Historic Places as architecturally significant so they can be recovered instead of demolished and replaced. The Restoring a Sense of Place program also has long-term goals, the primary one being to encourage adaptation strategies and interventions that will enhance resilience.

“Our official position as an organization is that you cannot put your home or property back the way it was and expect a different outcome during the next storm or flood event. Rather, we are working with stewards to strategize adaptation measures to make their significant buildings more resilient,” Hylton says. 

In pursuit of this mission, Architecture Sarasota is working with the federal government to gain as much information as they can. The National Park Service is helping fund a coastal assessment of cultural resources along the coast, specifically Sarasota School of Architecture buildings so the organization can better understand the threats and risks they face and can begin to develop strategies to protect those resources in the future. Hylton is optimistic about what the future holds.

“If there is a community that can become a model for addressing the issues of coastal resilience, it is Sarasota,” he says. “Sarasota has assets many communities
do not–intellectual capacity, collaboratively-minded, creativity born from an appreciation of arts and culture, history of design thinking and experimentation and the philanthropic moxie to harness these assets to envision Sarasota 2050.” 

Photography by Wes Roberts