New Publication: The Application of the Recommendation on Historic Urban Landscape (HUL) in Cuenca, Ecuador

“The application of the Recommendation on the Historic Urban Landscape in Cuenca, Ecuador - A New Approach to Cultural and Natural heritage” collects the research project “Reassessment of the cultural and natural heritage of the city of Cuenca departing from sustainable development strategies supported by the Recommendation on the Historic Urban Landscape” (PUH_C project). This project was jointly undertaken by the University of Cuenca, Municipality of Cuenca and the World Heritage Institute of Training and Research for the Asia and the Pacific Region (WHITR-AP).

The main objective of this publication is to promote the research and application of the 2011 UNESCO Recommendation on the Historic Urban Landscape, in Cuenca city. The Recommendation is a relatively new language in heritage management on an international scale. The opportunity to publish the PUH_C project is to produce a document presenting, from an academic point of view, the application of the Recommendation on HUL in the case of Cuenca, which has become one of the first Latin American cities working on this subject.

The publication includes the results of the research and it is divided into three parts. The first one consists of a theoretical framework in which the project is inserted in the international context on the Recommendation on the Historic Urban Landscape, the second part is composed of all analyses carried out by the different disciplines involved within the project. This section also includes a portion devoted to the stakeholders’ participatory process and workshops including the “Cuenca HUL Application Visionary Conference (7-8 May 2015)”. The document ends with some conclusions aimed to assess the state of the Historic Urban Landscape of the city of Cuenca, with reference to the Recommendation on the HUL and defining the role of the Municipality of Cuenca in the application of this Recommendation.

The book was published by the University of Cuenca with the financial support of the Netherlands Funds-in-Trust at the World Heritage Centre.