Abbott Lowell Cummings Award

The Abbott Lowell Cummings Award, named after the founding president of the Vernacular Architecture Forum, is conferred annually upon the book that has made the most significant contribution to the study of vernacular architecture and cultural landscapes. In judging the nominated works, the jurors look for a publication that:

• is based on primary research;
• emphasizes fieldwork that takes seriously the materiality of architecture and landscapes, and draws on particular elements of  environments as evidence;
• breaks new ground in interpretation or methodology; 
• contributes generally to the intellectual vitality of vernacular studies in North America; and
• nominated works must be in English.

Past Cummings Award Winners

2020 Cummings Award Recipient

The winner of the 2020 Abbott Lowell Cummings Award is C.J. Alvarez for Border Land, Border Water: A History of Construction on the U.S.-Mexico Divide, published by University of Texas Press, 2019, which tackles an original, ambitious, and timely project: interpreting the cultural landscape of the artificial line that both links and separates the United States and Mexico.

Please visit the 2020 Cummings Award page for more details Border Land, Border Water .

2021 Call for Nominations