Digitisation of historical plans, construction and property files

Thanks to generous funding from the state of Saxony-Anhalt from the special Covid-19 funds, the project »Digitisation of Historical Architectural Drawings, Building and Property Records from the Archive of the Francke Foundations« was realised at the August Hermann Francke Study Centre. The aim of the project was to permanently preserve and make digitally accessible key sources on the architectural history and administration of the Francke Foundations from the 18th to the 20th century.

As part of the project, around 2,000 large-format historical plans and floor plans—some of them coloured—as well as approximately 405,000 pages from the economic and administrative archives were digitised in accordance with current standards. As a result, the entire collection of architectural plans, comprising more than 3,400 drawings, is now available in the Digital Collections of the Study Centre. A detailed metadata schema was developed for the plans, enabling targeted searches by house, building component and detailed drawing.

The digitised sources provide an impressive record of three centuries of architectural history of the Francke Foundations and their external properties. By integrating them into the archival database and the Digital Collections, the material is now accessible worldwide and independently of location—not only to experts in fields such as heritage conservation, art history and social history, but also to anyone with an interest in culture. These sources are of central importance to the Francke Foundations’ identity: the buildings and properties—together with the historical collections—form the core of the institution and underpin its reputation as an educational and scholarly establishment of both regional and national significance.

The importance of this remarkable body of plans is also reflected in an accompanying, elaborately designed publication focusing on drawings and architectural plans from the 18th century. This systematic compilation provides insight into the planning stages, working methods and organisational principles of the Foundations’ architects and directors. The illustrated volume thus also exemplifies the kind of scholarly questions that can be explored through this valuable section of the archive.

Project period: 1 September – 31 December 2024