5) Heritage Champions

Dr.-Ing. Claus-Peter Echter is a conservationist, urban planner and sociologist. Echter is a scientific heritage consultant working in private practice since 2008 and based in Munich, Germany. He has extensive experience working in favour of cultural heritage at European and international level. Claus-Peter Echter was a member of the World Heritage Panel of ICOMOS for the evaluation of World Heritage nominations in 2014, 2015, 2017 and 2018 and has been a member of the ICOMOS Sustainable Development Working Group (SDWG) since 2015 and of the ICOMOS Task Force on the New European Bauhaus since 2021. He is ICOMOS focal point for the UN Habitat World Urban Campaign (WUC), elected CO-Chair of the WUC Partner Constituent Group Professionals and member of the WUC Steering Committee since 2020.

Claus-Peter Echter has been a member of Europa Nostra and ICOMOS since 2007 and was a Council member of Europa Nostra 2012-2021, and Honorary member of Europa Nostra Germany since 2019. He was Vice-President of Europa Nostra Germany from 2009 to 2019 and again from 2021. He has acted as a local assessor for the European Heritage Awards / Europa Nostra Awards for many years.

Claus-Peter Echter began his studies in sociology, receiving a Diploma from the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University, Frankfurt, he has completed postgraduate studies of urban planning and heritage conservation at the Technical University Munich (Certificates) and defended his Ph.D. in engineering (architecture) at the Technical University Berlin. He wrote a doctoral thesis on “Monument Topography: A Recording Tool and Cultural History Enterprise“ (2005).
He was Senior Researcher at the German Institute of Urban Affairs with the main tasks Heritage conservation and History of Urban Architecture from 1981 to 2007 and has written many books and articles and lectured on Architectural History and (Urban) Monument Preservation.

Adriaan Linters has extensive experience in the field of industrial cultural heritage. He received an MA in Contemporary History in 1973 and later worked as a researcher at the Centre for Industrial Archaeology from 1974 to 1975, at Flemish Heritage Agency from 1975 to 1979; for industrial heritage at the province of Limburg from 1980-1985; and as a lecturer at St.-Lucas School of Architecture from 1985 to 2003. Adriaan Linters worked as an independent heritage consultant from 2003 to 2018. He is Chairman of the Vlaamse Vereniging voor Industriële Archeologie, winner of the European Heritage Awards / Europa Nostra Awards in 2019 in the category Dedicated Service to Heritage.

Anđela is an Italian language professor with MA degrees in Cultures in Dialogue, EMJMD European Literary Cultures, and UNESCO Chair for Cultural policy and Management. Her academic journey and interest in different cultures took her to Italy, Senegal, and France, where she learned that heritage is not only where we come from, but also what gives us a sense of belonging. She is passionate about building stronger connections between youth and cultural heritage, with particular interest in endangered, neglected, unwanted and misused heritage. Currently she is an intern at Europa Nostra Serbia.

Sadi Petrela has been Executive Director of the Gjirokastra Foundation for the past 15 years, an organisation which has undertaken over 20 years of uninterrupted activity in culture conservation and development in the UNESCO site Gjirokastra in Albania. Previous to this role, Sadi Petrela has gained extensive experience in journalism, media ethics and history teaching.
Year on year, the Gjirokastra Foundation developed an intense and multifaceted activity in the conservation and development of the vast heritage in Gjirokastra (both town and surrounding area) and, in some cases, elsewhere in both Albania and neighbouring countries.
They have developed more than 50 projects, both large and small, covering almost all different areas of cultural heritage in Albania. Their fundraising and various projects with new innovative approaches have earned the Foundation a strong reputation at both national and regional levels.
The Foundation’s projects include, among others: the restoration and revitalization of traditional buildings; the preservation and development of traditional arts and crafts; creating a new historic museum of Gjirokastra and opening up a tunnel from Communist times as a tourist attraction; the development of traditional cuisine. The Gjirokastra Foundation uses a participatory approach and community involvement in culture heritage management, connecting the city with similar historic centres. Their activities are considered groundbreaking and example creating for Albania and the wider area, especially considering the difficult political, economic and social environment in which they are undertaken. Gjirokastra Foundation is a winner of European Heritage Awards / Europa Nostra Award in the category of Dedicated Service to Heritage for the year 2021.

Marianne R. Ytterdal, Assistant Professor at Aalesund University College in Norway, covering Mercantile, Maritime, and Technical English, Cultural Differences and Project Presentations, recently retired. She studied English and American Languages and Background, History of Art, Nordic languages and literature and Educational Science at the Universities of Bergen, Oslo and Trondheim. She has been active within Europa Nostra since 2000, in the years 2007 – 2009 in the new governance group. She is currently President of the Board of the Kjell Holm Foundation in Norway, which she joined in 2003. For 25 years, the last five as President, she was a board member of Fortidsminneforeningen: The Society for the Preservation of Norwegian Ancient Monuments, an NGO that owns and maintains 41 properties of cultural significance. Other cultural heritage boards of interest are: the European Network of National Heritage Organisations, Jugendstilsenteret (The Norwegian Art Nouveau Centre), and Den norske Kulturminnedagen (European Heritage Days). Ytterdal has also published a number of textbooks for the teaching of Technical and Practical English, the most recent having been released in 2015.

Eugen Vaida is an architect at Asociatia Monumentum, which has been a member organisation of Europa Nostra since 2019. He is a graduate of the Faculty of Architecture at the University of Architecture and Urban Planning „Ion Mincu”, in Bucharest. Among his many projects, Eugen coordinated the Daia Heritage Valorization Plan, developed by the Global Heritage Fund in 2017-2018, and is currently coordinating The Ambulance for Monuments project, which won an Award and the Public Choice Award at the European Heritage Awards / Europa Nostra Awards 2020. He had a defining role in the development of the summer school movement in Romania which has its key mission in educating young architects and students. He is a Member of the Advisory Group for the European Commission on heritage policies, the Founding member and president of The Federation for Transylvanian Heritage and advisor for the Romanian Ministry for Culture and National Identity. Eugen Vaida published numerous literary works on cultural heritage, including “Saving the culture of the other” (Alţîna, 2021) and “The Architectural Guidebook For Contextual Planning in the Saxon Area” of the Order of Romanian Architects (RURAL Working Group). Eugen Vaida became an Ashoka Fellow in November 2021, benefitting from a lifetime bursary to continue his work in the field of heritage from the world’s leading social entrepreneurship organisation. For its dedicated efforts in the education of the public of all generation, Asociatia Monumentum, lead by Eugen Vaida, was knighted by The Romanian Presidency in 2021.