In recent years, historic building materials were often abandoned for financial reasons, until their historical and cultural value and their contribution to resource conservation became aware. In the 1970s it became obvious that gross mistakes were made in the restoration of historic buildings. Craftsmen used wrong materials or the wrong techniques and thus destroyed more they they preserved. This led to conflicts with the goals of historic preservation. There were not enough skilled craftsmen, who mastered the ancient techniques and knew how to deal with old materials.The project objective was to establish a venue in each participating country, which should serve as a "center of excellence for knowledge about and further education in preservation." This should be achieved by establishing study depots (as reference exhibits), which were equipped with a collection of historic building materials, parts, components and tools and a library holding information on historical construction methods and technologies but also about recent research activities within historic civil engineering. Workshops on traditional craft techniques and the use of historic building materials should be offered in the center of excellence as integral part of the project.