Editor's Note

Abstract

Editor's Note Anna Vemer Andrzejewski With this issue, Buildings & Landscapes is pleased to announce transitions in our editorial team. Cynthia G. Falk, Professor of Material Culture in the Cooperstown Graduate Program at SUNY-Oneonta, has served faithfully as an editor of the journal for the past five years. She has stepped down as part of the editorial rotation planned by the VAF Board. An ambitious scholar, Cindy has published two books: Architecture and Artifacts of the Pennsylvania Germans: Constructing Identity in Early America (Penn State, 2008) and Barns of New York: Rural Architecture of the Empire State (Cornell, 2013). Cindy has put many projects on hold to devote herself to the journal, and we know she will now take those up in earnest. Matthew G. Lasner, associate professor at Hunter College, has been our excellent book review editor for the past three years. Matt is author of High Life: Condo Living in the Suburban Century (Yale, 2012) and editor of Affordable Housing in New York: The People, Places, and Policies That Transformed a City (Princeton, 2015). Building on the achievements of his predecessors, Matt has solidified the book reviews as a core part of the journal, expanding the kinds of books reviewed as well as quantity (you will see in this issue we have thirteen book reviews!). The organization and its members are grateful for Cindy's and Matt's leadership and wish them well. New editors are stepping in to fill these very big shoes. Carl Lounsbury, formerly of the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation and currently at the College of William and Mary, joins me as the journal's coeditor. As many of you know, Carl is a founding member of the VAF, a past president, and is well known for having attended each and every annual conference dating back to the organization's founding in 1980. Carl has authored and edited numerous books and countless journal articles, among them The Courthouses of Early Virginia: An Architectural History (Virginia, 2005); the always-useful Illustrated Guide to Early Southern Architecture and Landscape (Oxford, 1994); and the monumental volume (coedited with Cary Carson) The Chesapeake House: Architectural Investigation by Colonial Williamsburg (North Carolina, 2013). Carl's scholarly expertise as a historian of early America as well as his engagement with museums and public history make him ideally suited to serve as an editor of Buildings & Landscapes. I'm also pleased to welcome a dynamic team of book review editors to the journal, both associate professors from the School of Architecture at the University of Virginia. Andrew Johnston teaches a variety of courses in historic preservation and classes that integrate preservation and the practice of design. His book Mercury and the Making of California: Mining, Landscape, and Race, 1840–1890 was published by the University Press of Colorado in 2013. Jessica Sewell teaches courses in urban studies as well as courses in gendered space and material culture; she also holds an appointment in the American Studies program. Jessica is author of Women and the Everyday City: Public Space in San Francisco, 1890–1915 (University of Minnesota Press, 2011) as well as numerous articles, including some in [End Page v] this journal. We look forward to Andrew and Jessica continuing to expand the range of pieces reviewed in this journal. Buildings & Landscapes remains in very capable hands under the new team and with the support of the tremendous staff at the University of Minnesota Press. Suffice it to say that while I will truly miss working closely with Cindy and Matt, I have enjoyed the transition as the new editors have assumed their duties. The VAF welcomes a great variety of scholars and practitioners, and this range will be represented in the kinds of scholarship this team will bring to the pages of the journal. Buildings & Landscapes remains dedicated to understanding all facets of the built environment and its relationship to people and place. [End Page vi] Copyright © 2018 Vernacular Architecture Forum