2025 Preservation Awards

What buildings represent the best of historic St. Pete? Are you proud of the restoration work you’ve done on your home, office, or other historic building? Do you have a neighbor or neighborhood that should be recognized for how they’ve used historic properties to make St. Pete special? Submit a nomination for a Preservation Award from Preserve the ‘Burg!

Award Categories and Criteria:

• Restoration or Rehabilitation (Residential and Commercial)
  These awards recognize exemplary restoration of historic buildings (generally built before 1973) that allow for contemporary use. A restoration project accurately returns a building to an earlier condition and/or appearance based on historical or physical evidence. Restoration focuses on the retention or repair of materials from the most significant time in a property’s history, while permitting the removal of materials from other periods. Rehabilitation recognizes the sensitive use of replica materials to return a depreciated building to productive use.
• Stewardship (Residential and Commercial)
  Awards in this category are presented to long term owners of property who are ensuring the preservation of historic structures or other features of a property through care and maintenance, stabilization, or their protection of the historic structure or feature.
• Adaptive Reuse (Commercial, or Residential to Commercial)
  An adaptive reuse retains St. Pete's historic streetscape while updating the building’s interior and mechanicals to serve a new use. It gives an “outdated” building a new purpose. Priority is given to retaining original exterior elements, ghost signs, scale, and place in its community.
• Compatible Design (Commercial or Residential)
  Compatible Design Awards recognize a contemporarily designed or new building or business buildout that exemplifies the building’s compatibility with that of an adjacent or nearby historic structure or enhances the character of a historic neighborhood. Business buildouts with sensitive interior treatment that makes the business a “historic St. Pete” destination are appropriate for nomination. The building must contribute to the story of the neighborhood and our city.
• Preservationist or Educator of the Year
  This award may be given to a St. Petersburg resident or local group who has demonstrated exemplary and sustained activities in promoting the preservation of historic structures in St. Petersburg or in promoting awareness in the field of historic preservation. While the focus of the award is on local action, the work of the individual or group on a state or national level may also be considered.
• Maureen Stafford Excellence in Preservation Award
  The Stafford Award recognizes an individual or organization that has a demonstrated track record of excellence working to renovate and restore historic properties in St. Petersburg. The recipient will be recognized with a $1,000 check from Preserve the ‘Burg.