Providence Preservation Society Today

Marisa is the Executive Director of the Providence Preservation Society and joined PPS most recently from Rhode Island School of Design’s Center for Complexity, where she has served as Associate Director since 2022. Prior to her work at RISD, she was at the John Nicholas Brown Center for Public Humanities and Cultural Heritage at Brown University, where she taught courses on preservation and heritage practice and led the Center’s academic and public programs.

Marisa holds a PhD in the History of Art and Architecture from Yale University, an MA in History from the University of Chicago, and a BA from Princeton University. She is an active speaker and writer on preservation history and practice, American architecture, and public art with a longstanding commitment to Providence’s cultural landscapes, histories, and diverse communities. In addition to Brown, she has taught courses on community-centered art and design practices at RISD and on public writing at the Gloria McDonald Women’s Facility (Department of Corrections) through College Unbound.