History

The Venice Charter was born from the need to create an association of conservation and restoration specialists, independent from the already existing association of museologists called ICOM.
In 1957 in Paris, the First Congress of Architects and Specialists of Historic Buildings recommended that the countries lacking a central organisation for the protection of historic buildings provide for the establishment of such an authority and, in the name of UNESCO, that all member states of UNESCO join the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property (ICCROM) based in Rome.

The Second Congress of Architects and Specialists of Historic Buildings, in Venice in 1964, adopted 13 resolutions, the first one being the International Restoration Charter, better known as the Venice Charter, and the second one, put forward by UNESCO, provided for the creation of the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS). 

To learn more about the history of ICOMOS: Scientific Journal - 30 years of ICOMOSVisit also ICOMOS 50th anniversary webpage