Purpose

The Electronic Library of Colorado Architecture, Landscape, and Planning (ELCALP) is an educational tool, and is designed for use by students at all levels, for the public, and for members of the professions of architecture, landscape architecture, urban design, and planning. It was created by faculty, staff, and students of the College of Architecture and Planning at the University of Colorado at Denver and Health Sciences Center, which supports graduate and PhD programs on the Downtown Denver Campus and undergraduate programs on the Boulder campus. Our aim is to make images and information about buildings and sites in Colorado easily accessible in ways that are useful for many different people. This on-line database documents a wide array of sites, structures, and projects, including those which are significant because they have received awards from professional design and planning associations or because they appear on state and national registers of historic places. The intent is to help foster the appreciation and study of these Colorado buildings and sites.

Secondarily, the purpose of the ELCALP is to help students in the College of Architecture and Planning become more knowledgeable about all the facets of its production, including such things as computer applications, technical photography, professional descriptive writing, digital image capture, and text entry and editing. Many of the images and texts on the site were created by the College of Architecture and Planning’s students as a part of regular course work. Additionally, the system includes images scanned from the 35mm slide collections of faculty members, thereby sharing with the citizens of Colorado and the public elsewhere some of their expertise in fields such as architectural history, environmental psychology, landscape ecology, urban design, and land use planning. Other images have come from donors from outside the College who have generously contributed to this educational endeavor.