Hershel Shepard to receive the de Aviles Award

The de Avilés Award is presented only by the city commission and only once a year. For 2012, that presentation will be on Monday, March 26 when the commission recognizes Hershel Shepard as the 30th recipient of the prestigious de Avilés Award.

The presentation will take place early in the commission’s regularly scheduled meeting starting at 5:00pm in The Alcazar Room, 75 King Street. The meeting is open to the public.

A renowned architect, Shepard has devoted much of his career working in Florida and much of it in Northeast Florida, including St. Augustine. Specializing in historic preservation, Herschel’s credits include the restoration of the Historic 1902 Florida State Capitol in Tallahassee and the Florida Theater restoration in Jacksonville and dozens of other properties in communities throughout the state. His nationally recognized expertise in historic preservation has served many Florida communities during his career, and certainly none more so than St. Augustine.

The de Avilés Award was initiated by the commission in 1988 and since 2002 has limited recipients to one per year. The guidelines specify only that the recipients be those who are, “...identified in the field of public service or those well-known and respected by the citizenry who have dedicated and honorable service to the community of St. Augustine and St. Johns County.”

Shepard’s work in St. Augustine has contributed to the preservation of many of the city’s most prominent structures, including the Acosta House, the Joaneda House, the O'Reilly House, the Tovar House, Avero House at St. Photios Shrine, the de-Mesa Sanchez House, the Gonzalez-Alvarez ("Oldest") House, Ximenez-Fatio House, the Castillo de San Marcos, Government House and the Alcazar Hotel (City Hall/Lightner Museum).

              

Hershel Shepard, the 30th recipient of the de Aviles Award,will be

honored by the city commission at a presentation on on March 26.

After two decades of his first career as an architect in his native Jacksonville , Shepard started a second career as a professor of architecture at the University of Florida where he held the Bienecke-Reeves Distinguished Chair in Architectural Preservation. The recipient of many awards for his work, Herschel is an advisor emeritus of the National Trust for Historic Preservation and a founder and director of the Florida Trust for Historic Preservation.

For more information on the de Aviles Award and the city’s other honorary award, The Order of La Florida, including rosters of recipients of each award, click here.

For more information about the presentation, contact the Public Affairs office at 904.825.1004 or at info@citystaug.com.