Chicago Center for Cultural Heritage Preservation (C3HP)

The Chicago Center for Cultural Heritage Preservation (C3HP) is an interdisciplinary center with a global footprint based at the University of Chicago.

Our mission is to conduct innovative, collaborative projects and build local capacity to document, preserve, and restore cultural heritage across the globe in countries and communities whose monuments, histories, or very existence are at risk. By preserving heritage, we can help build a stronger, more prosperous, and peaceful world.

We bring together experts from across the University and the international heritage community to help preserve and protect cultural heritage that is under threat. Our initiatives not only address the current destruction of heritage, looting, and the illicit antiquities trade, but also take a proactive approach to strengthen local infrastructures and policies to reduce the risk of future damage.

The Center focuses on projects with specific deliverables and metrics to evaluate program effectiveness.

Digital Heritage refers to cultural, historical, and intellectual materials of enduring value that exist in digital form, encompassing both materials that are originally created in digital formats, as well as materials that have been digitized from analog sources, such as scanned documents or artifacts.

Digital Heritage is significant because it enables broader access to cultural content and preserves heritage for future generations in the face of risks like physical decay or loss.