Cultural Guardian

The fiercest protector of Palm Beach County’s historic architecture is Sharon Koskoff, who founded the Art Deco Society of the Palm Beaches 37 years ago.

Soon after arriving in Florida she began visiting South Beach’s colorful Art Deco hotels — placed on the National Register of Historic Places. Koskoff met the Miami Beach woman credited with saving a swath of that district from the wrecking ball, Barbara Baer Capitman, who recruited Koskoff to do similar work in the Palm Beaches, setting her on a mission, “to uncover the secret heritage of Palm Beach County’s public places and private spaces.”

The nonprofit has identified dozens of rare and endangered 1930s and 1940s Streamline Moderne buildings. Koskoff, 70, an award-winning muralist, art historian, author and teacher living in Delray Beach, also spotlights Midcentury Modern (MiMo) architecture from the 1950s and 1960s.

Her cataloging and documenting has helped economically revitalize cities, including Lake Worth. When seeking approval for a new store, Publix adhered to city commissioners’ request to match Lake Worth’s prominent Art Deco aesthetic, influenced by Koskoff’s book highlighting the area’s rich concentration of such architecture, including two nearly century-old iconic art institutions.

Not bad for someone who began as a salesclerk in a Brooklyn needlepoint shop. Koskoff wanted a career in the arts, so she followed her family to South Florida.

“Had I stayed in New York, I never would have accomplished what I’ve been able to do here,” she says, referring to not only starting the county’s Art Deco Society but also exhibiting and winning awards for her fine artworks at various fairs, galleries and museums.

She came full circle last April when she organized the first-ever Art Deco World Congress tour of the Palm Beaches, which also honored Capitman’s success. Prior to Koskoff putting Palm Beach County on this particular culture vulture map, the prestigious World Art Deco Congress had met every other year (over the last 32 years) in Miami Beach, New York, Los Angeles, Melbourne, Havana, Cape Town, Montreal and Buenos Aires, but had never convened in the Palm Beaches.

For Koskoff, preserving old treasures never gets old.

“I am thrilled to have new discoveries, just when we think we have found everything significant. Spreading awareness of the fabulous cultural institutions in the Palm Beaches is my passion,” Koskoff says. “My mission is to preserve, protect and promote!”