Architecture & Urban Planning

Artstor collaborated with the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation at Columbia University (GSAPP) and Avery Architectural & Fine Arts Library to release ~ 20,000 images of architectural plans and sections and related materials in the Digital Library.

The Prints & Photographs Division (P&P) has more than 140 collections that support the study of architecture, design, and engineering (ADE) through a vast array of original and often unique graphic and photographic documentation. Our special strength is the history and development of American architecture, engineering works, public monuments, and sculpture from the 1600s to the present day. To a lesser degree, we have remarkable original drawings and photographs for urban planning, interior design, and industrial design.

The Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS) and the Historic American Engineering Record (HAER) collections document achievements in architecture, engineering, and landscape design in the United States and its territories through a comprehensive range of building types, engineering technologies, and landscapes, including examples as diverse as the Pueblo of Acoma, houses, windmills, one-room schools, the Golden Gate Bridge, and buildings designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.

The National Register of Historic Places is the official list of the Nation's historic places worthy of preservation. Authorized by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the National Park Service's National Register of Historic Places is part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate, and protect America's historic and archeological resources.

The Gottscho-Schleisner Collection is comprised of over 29,000 images primarily of architectural subjects, including interiors and exteriors of homes, stores, offices, factories, historic buildings, and other structures. Subjects are concentrated chiefly in the northeastern United States, especially the New York City area, and Florida. Included are the homes of notable Americans, such as Raymond Loewy, and of several U.S. presidents, as well as color images of the 1939-40 New York World's Fair. Many of the photographs were commissioned by architects, designers, owners and architectural publications, and document important achievements in American 20th-century architecture and interior design.

Archival collections organized by Architect, California focused.

The Cities and Buildings Database is a collection of digitized images of buildings and cities drawn from across time and throughout the world, available to students, researchers and educators on the web.

SAH Archipedia is an authoritative online encyclopedia of the U.S. built environment organized by the Society of Architectural Historians and the University of Virginia Press. It contains histories, photographs, and maps for over 20,000 structures and places. These are mostly buildings, but as you explore SAH Archipedia you will also find landscapes, infrastructure, monuments, artwork, and more. This cross-section of the country demonstrates the richness and diversity of architecture and building practice across many centuries, from mud brick to steel, from ancient cliff dwellings to contemporary office towers—a history that unfolds in individual building entries and thematic essays written by leading architectural historians who survey and explain styles and typologies, materials and techniques, and social and political contexts, from local to state to national levels.

Resources to researching the physical and social history of a building, including floor plans, insurance atlases, etc. This resource can be used to determine historic designation.

Architects and designers from around the world send ArchDaily their latest projects, products, news, and opinions. Using innovative technologies, they collect, curate, and publish the best information on a growing database of knowledge for millions of monthly readers in over 230 countries.

Archnet is an authority, a growing repository, and a tool for teaching and learning about the architecture of Muslim societies, past, and present. Archnet is a partnership between the Aga Khan Trust for Culture (AKTC) and the Aga Khan Documentation Center, MIT Libraries (AKDC@MIT).

CyArk is a non profit organization founded in 2003 to digitally record, archive and share the world's most significant cultural heritage and ensure that these places continue to inspire wonder and curiosity for decades to come. We assist those who work to manage and preserve these sites by providing engineering drawings and detailed maps to assist in critical conservation work. We also capture a comprehensive record of the site that can be used in recovery efforts following damage or catastrophic loss.

This gateway to architecture around the world and across history documents a thousand buildings and hundreds of leading architects, selected over ten years by the editors of ArchitectureWeek, with photographic images and architectural drawings, integrated maps and timelines, 3D building models, commentaries, bibliographies, web links, and more, for famous designers and structures of all kinds.

The digital collection includes over 80 architectural drawings and sketches by Milwaukee architects Willis and Lillian Leenhouts. Selected drawings demonstrate the range of projects undertaken by the firm - primarily residential, but also public buildings and urban development projects - from the mid-1940s through the 1980s.

Cities Around the World presents over 6,100 photographic images from the slide collections of the American Geographical Society Library. The images selected for this project focus on architecture, city life, people, transportation and other aspects of urban development, such as neighborhoods, commercial streets, and business districts.

This collection features maps housed at the City of Milwaukee’s official records center and document repository, the Milwaukee Municipal Research Center (MRC), located in the basement level of the Zeidler Municipal Building, 841 N. Broadway. The majority of the materials here were created by city departments.

This collection presents images of Milwaukee neighborhoods from the Far Northwest Side to the Far South Side. The selection of images is limited by the current boundaries of the city of Milwaukee. The digital collection provides a visual documentation of the development of the city of Milwaukee from the mid-1880s to the early 1990.

The Digital Sanborn Maps of Milwaukee 1894 & 1910 are two fire insurance atlases featuring detailed color maps of Milwaukee. Produced by the Sanborn Map Company, the 1894 atlas includes four volumes, consisting of 450 map sheets and the 1910 atlas includes eight volumes, consisting of 830 map sheets.

The UWM School of Architecture and Urban Planning Resource Center maintains its own library of specialized collections including: books, current journals on architecture, landscape architecture and urban planning, and an image database with over 50,000 images. NOTE: The online Resource Center Search is restricted to AUP-affiliated users in that building.

Some plans exist for commercial buildings, churches and theaters. They are kept on microfilm in the City Records Center in the basement of the Zeidler Municipal Building. Plans were NOT kept for residential buildings.

Historic Milwaukee, Inc. (HMI) is dedicated to increasing awareness of and commitment to Milwaukee’s architecture, history, and the built environment.

The Land & Space Development Database follows newly completed and ongoing commercial projects throughout the Milwaukee area. The list includes apartment buildings, shopping centers, office developments, industrial projects and, of course, breweries.

MCHS was founded in 1935 as the repository for County records and since that time, has continued to expand our services to the community. More than one million documents and photographs and more than 60,000 artifacts are preserved by MCHS and it is our hope to share these resources with the community.

Located within the Milwaukee Public Library's downtown Central Library, the Wisconsin Architectural Archive is dedicated to the acquisition and preservation of architectural drawings and materials. WAA holdings currently encompass more than 12,500 projects, representing more than 470 architects from firms dating back to 1851, and the archive continues to grow with new acquisitions. The Wisconsin Architectural Archives at MPL have no public access. Users may contact the Art/Museum/Recreation Department at MPL-Central by phone to schedule an appointment: 414-286-3071.

Search the most up-to-date version of the National or State Register of Historic Places and/or the Society's Architecture and History Inventory for property records.

The field notes and plat maps of the public land survey of Wisconsin are a valuable resource for original land survey information, as well as for understanding Wisconsin's landscape history. The survey of Wisconsin was conducted between 1832 and 1866 by the federal General Land Office. This work established the township, range and section grid; the pattern upon which land ownership and land use is based.