Returning home from a stellar few days at UNAM in Mexico City, where the Construction History Society of America held its 10th regular meeting as part of a bi-national event with the newly formed Mexican society, which announced its founding as part of our closing ceremonies.

When CHSA started in 2007, we debated whether the right term was “of America” or “of the Americas,” and this week was clear evidence that the boundaries between largely English-language work north of the Rio Grande and largely Spanish-speaking scholarship south of it are at once important and permeable. With simultaneous translation available on any mobile phone, being able to present and understand in multiple languages has enriched events like this, making more scholarship available to those of us who aren’t multi-lingual, and provided broader audiences for those who aren’t working in a discipline’s lingua franca.

All of which is to say that it was a real joy to hear about a modernist baseball stadium in Oaxaca, or the use of iron in Guastavino vaults in Jefferson’s Rotunda (!) delivered in scholars’ native languages and be able to follow along. The conference’s chronological range matched its geographical reach, with good papers on 16th century vaulting in central America, the selling and lived experience of Chicago skyscrapers in the 1890s, and the design and expansion of UNAM itself, reflecting the huge range that Construction History encompasses, and the enthusiasm its practitioners have for seeing some of our basic principles applied across time and space.

That UNAM paper was particularly fascinating, since the campus itself (one of two educational precincts in the Americas designated a UNESCO site, along with UVA) is an incredible collection of ambitious postwar design, from the famous mosaic-clad library tower to the football (yes, football) stadium that hosted track and field events for the 1968 Olympics. The welcome there, thanks to our UNAM hosts and a small army of student volunteers, was particularly warm, a day-long group bus tour of Teotihuacan was jaw-dropping, and the food was stellar. Hoping to be back soon.

In the meantime, the next big Construction History event will be the next International Congress in Turin in June, 2027. Want to join that good looking group above? Submit an abstract! There are still three weeks before the submittal deadline, and there’s a particularly good session on the history of Vertical Urbanism (subtle), more information here…