Standards for Historic Preservation

Work on historic properties must adhere to the Secretary of the Interior’s Standards for Historic Preservation.  The Secretary of the Interior’s Standards for the Treatment of Historic Properties are common sense historic preservation principles in non-technical language. They promote historic preservation best practices that will help to protect our nation’s irreplaceable cultural resources. The following are the four standards that are distinct, but interrelated approaches for completing the work:

• Preservation
• Restoration
• Reconstruction
• Rehabilitation