2007 Notable Projects: Religious Institutions
Vol.02 No.04

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Architypes’ Notable Projects
Architype finds inspiration in projects that somehow redefine our understanding of a certain typology.  Through good design, these architects created smart and forward thinking solutions to the particular constraints or challenges presented by each project.  Grouped together by type, they provide a survey of innovation taking place at several different scales, promoted by both large and small firms. Presented here in the words and images of their own creative team, the following projects also offer an index of ideas and solutions as well as creative people and products within the industry.

Cathedral of Christ the Light, Oakland, California
Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP

Model Photography: © Gerald Ratto Drawings: © Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP

The City of Oakland's Cathedral of Christ the Light will resonate as a place of worship and instill a sense of solace, spiritual renewal and respite from the secular world—it will be a sanctuary in the broadest sense of the word. Comprised of a 1,500-seat sanctuary with side chapels, a baptistery and dependencies, the Cathedral will honor its religious and civic obligations to both the Catholic Diocese and the City. With a building form based on an inner wooden vessel contained within a veil of glass—both of which are anchored on a sculptural concrete “Reliquary Wall”—the design conveys an inclusive statement of welcome and openness as the community’s symbolic soul.

Inspiration
In this Cathedral, like others throughout history; light and its poetic introduction within the spaces of worship is considered a sacred phenomenon. The building’s geometry lends itself to the "ring" advocated in the seminal 1953 book The Church Incarnate by German theorist and architect Rudolf Schwarz. Schwarz proposed arranging congregants in a circle around the altar to create a sense of community and inclusion; an idea later embraced by the Second Vatican Council.

Design Concept
The concept was to make the site unconditionally open and welcome to all, regardless of faith, and to celebrate its connection to the surrounding natural environment and to the City, as an extension of Oakland’s civic realm.

Sustainability and Stability
The Cathedral will combine ancient techniques with state-of-the-art contemporary technologies to attain the highest level of sustainability possible.
The interior climate will be maintained through an advanced version of the ancient Roman technique of thermal inertia attained through mass and radiant heat. During the day, the Cathedral will be entirely lit by daylight.

The dominant building systems will use renewable, recycled, or low-energy materials, including laminated wood, aluminum and concrete. The use of steel will be minimized. Douglas Fir, obtained through certified harvesting processes, will be used throughout, typically laminated.

The Diocese’s goal is that this building will serve the City of Oakland for at least four centuries. Using a friction-pendulum base isolation system, the Cathedral is designed to withstand a 1000-year earthquake. This system will significantly reduce seismic forces on the structure, as well as the construction cost of the architectural enclosure.

The structure itself is a hybrid system in which the outer surface, comprised of two conical glass segments, is laced to the inner surface, comprised of the two spherical wood segments defining the sanctuary space. This system allows an overall building mass of extreme lightness and strength, but required very sophisticated computer modeling and a yearlong series of panel reviews by leading structural engineering professionals to achieve approval from the City.

Construction is scheduled for completion in late 2008.
- Craig Hartman, 2007

Owner
Catholic Cathedral Corporation of the East Bay

Architect
Skidmore, Owings & Merrill
www.som.com
Design Architect:
Craig Hartman
Managing Partner:
Gene Schnair
Sr Design Architect:
Patrick Daly
Technical Partner:
Keith Boswell
Project Manager:
Ray Kuca
Architecture: Eric Keune, David Diamond, Denise Hall Montgomery, Jane Lee, Chris Kimball, Christiana Kyrillou, Surjanto, Gary Rohrbacher, Elizabeth Valadez, Mariah Nelson, Peter Jackson, Lisa Finster, Ayumi Sugiyama, Doug Smith, Liang Wu, Katie Motchen
Interiors: Tamara Dinsmore, Chanda Capelli, Carmen Carrasco, Suzanne Le Blanc,
Environmental Graphics: Lonny Israel, Alan Sinclair
Structural Engineering Partner:
Mark Sarkisian
Senior Structural Engineer:
Peter Lee
Structural Engineer: Eric Long
Structural Team: Sarah Diegan, Jean-Pierre Chakar, Rupa Garai, Aaron Mazieka, Shea Bond, Ernest Vayl, Feliciano Racines

Executive Architect
Kendall/Heaton Associates
wwww.kendall-heaton.com

Engineers and Consultants
Structural:
Skidmore, Owings & Merrill
Mechanical:
Taylor Engineering, LLC
Electrical:
The Engineering Enterprise
Construction Management:
CMA, Inc.
Landscape Architect:
Peter Walker and Partners

Contractor(s)
Webcor Builders

Photographer(s)
Model: © Gerald Ratto

Holy Rosary Church Complex, St. Amant, Louisiana
Trahan Architects

Photography: ©Timothy Hursley, The Arkansas Office Drawings: ©Trahan Architects

The commission is an honest exploration of form, function, natural light and materials, providing an engaging and profound study in sacred space.  The oratory is the focal point of its rural Roman Catholic campus, predominant by its unique placement and floating within the sacred precinct of a courtyard space. 
The master plan creates a strong sense of place for all functions of the Parish, drawing a distinction between the program's sacred and secular components.  Secular components of the campus take form as linear or "edge" buildings framing a courtyard where the oratory is located.  Traversing the courtyard in a clockwise direction, the path leads ultimately to the oratory.  In the opposite direction, the path leads always back to the community. 
The oratory, like a crescendo in music, creates a deliberate break in the fabric of the campus.  Position, formal purity and height reflect the importance of the spiritual program and serve to distinguish the chapel from its surroundings.  Rotation of the chapel further underscores the distinct orientation of secular and sacred lives. The resulting void between oratory and secular pieces creates an outdoor room appropriate for large communal gatherings, smaller gatherings or private meditation near the chapel.
Design of the oratory stems from the concept of identifying a pure, comfortable, sacred space every human has experienced - the womb.  Since the womb has no orientation of up or down, all sides are treated equally, thus evoking a strong sense of mystery.  All six sides of the oratory cube are the same size, color and texture to create this same lack of orientation and resulting in the same sense of mystery. 
This careful and deliberate challenge of one's sense of place continues through the rotation between exterior and interior spaces.  Rotation of the chapel exterior is accompanied by a reciprocal rotation of the sacred chamber.  This second rotation acts to realign sacred space with the orientation of the main campus, signifying a union of spiritual and secular experience.
To satisfy the human desire for definition, apertures were created to introduce natural light to the oratory interior.  Light enters through a variety of openings carved from the wall thickness without revealing context or light source beyond.  In addition to giving occupants a sense of orientation, the obscured presence of light is symbolic of the paschal mystery of Christ.  More directly, each aperture is a meditation on a single episode of the paschal journey, metaphors for the passage of death, resurrection, ascension and eternal presence.
The transition into the oratory's sacred space is also celebrated through an experience of light.  A single threshold containing a sculptural cast-glass door was designed to gather and refract light.  When approached, edges of the door appear to glow with the illumination from within.
 The palette of materials is limited to board-formed concrete, plate glass and cast glass.  Neither opulent nor austere, the Chapel presents a thoughtful meditation on sacred spaces and the spatial embodiment of spiritual experience.

Owner
Holy Rosary Catholic Church

Architect
Trahan Architects
www.trahanarchitects.com
Partner in Charge/Designer:
Trey Trahan, FAIA
Project Team:
Brad Davis, Kirk Edwards AIA, Bryan Hammond, Michael Monceaux AIA, Melissa Duhon, Lisa Hargrave AIA, Jason Hargrave AIA

Engineer(s)
Structural: 
Schrenk & Peterson Consulting Engineers
MEP:
Apex Engineering Corporation

Consultant(s)
Finishes and Furnishing:
Lauren Bombet Interiors

Contractor(s)
Quality Design and Construction, Inc.

Photographer(s)
© Timothy Hursley, The Arkansas Office

St. Edwards University Chapel and Holy Cross Institute, Austin, Texas
Rick Joy Architects

Drawings: © Rick Joy Architects

The St. Edward's University Chapel, Campus Ministry and Holy Cross Institute complex is positioned at the Northeast end of campus between the historic core and the dormitory quadrant.  This sacred mini campus offers a spiritual threshold to and from the educational zones of the larger campus.
The three buildings are arranged around a central sacred mall, which will serve at times as an outdoor chapel under the canopies of the grove of white birch trees.
The chapel, the only non orthogonal building on campus and the only one oriented due north and south, is a monolithic subtle curved form of two foot thick white Texas limestone rubble.  One enters the chapel via one of the only two openings and into an exterior courtyard with a reflecting pool.  Upon entering the massive wooden door to the chapel one encounters a silver reflective form which offers a ghosted non defined reflection representative of the individual's spirit reduced to essence.  Within the chapel the focus is fixed to the north by the flood sacred white light over the altar.  The baptismal font lies in the center of the space, and two small prayer chapels also with natural light are located at the rear of the chapel.

Owner
St. Edwards University

Architect
Rick Joy Architects
www.rickjoy.com
Principal:
Rick Joy
Project Architect:
Cade Hayes
Project Team:
Matias Zegers, Anthony Dimari

Engineer(s)
Structural:
Harris Engineering Services      

Consultant(s)
Lighting:
Ljusarkitektur P&O
MP&E:
Advantech Facility Design

Bigelow Chapel, New Brighton, Minnesota
HGA Architects and Engineers

Photography: © Paul Warchol Drawings: © HGA Architects and Engineers

The United Theological Seminary of the Twin Cities, located on an 11-acre campus in New Brighton, Minnesota, is an ecumenical graduate and professional school of theology. While the seminary is of the United Church of Christ, its 250 students come from a variety of faiths, including United Methodist, Lutheran and Presbyterian; Roman Catholic, Judaism and Baptist; African Methodist Episcopal and Unitarian Universalist.
The seminary requested a 5,300 square-foot chapel building with a flexible sanctuary able to accommodate seating in a variety of configurations, along with a narthex, restrooms and a small office. The new $3.1 million chapel needed to connect to an existing classroom building and architecturally address a library across the lawn to the west, two simple structures erected in 1962 and made of buff-colored brick and precast concrete. The other two buildings on campus exhibit a similar straightforward modern style.
The real challenge set forth by the seminary, however, was a spiritual one. The sanctuary, as the focus of the building, had to be accessible-iconographically and aesthetically-to the seminary’s ecumenical community. While evoking the eminence and presence of God, the sanctuary was to quiet the spirit by addressing the religious lives of diverse people.
Rather than thinking in terms of a Christian worship space, the design embodies a spiritual one with a trinity of qualities: intimacy, warmth and light. The first two qualities are conveyed through a series of translucent, honey-colored, quilted maple panels that ripple up and down the interior of the sanctuary’s west-facing stainless steel curtain wall. To achieve this effect, one big-leaf maple log from the Pacific Northwest was shipped to Germany to be peeled, shipped to Indiana where it was cut into veneer strips 1/32-inch thick and laminated on each side with non-reflective acrylic. Maple floors and quilted maple ceiling panels, which extend from the dropped ceiling of the processional hall into the sanctuary, reinforce the sense of tranquil enclosure.
The translucent maple panels radiate a sense of warmth inside the sanctuary while the curving wood frame wraps the visitor in a gentle embrace that creates an intimate environment for reflection and prayer. As sunlight passes from the curtain wall through the maple veneer panels, the panels in turn filter and enrich the interior light. Light also enters the sanctuary through clerestory windows along the east wall and through skylights.
In addition to the focus on light and space, the connection between God and nature plays a central role inside the chapel. Two large windows in the sanctuary frame landscaped views. The south window overlooks the meditation garden and its lone musclewood tree, while a north window borders a single white oak tree. The exterior/interior glass fins screen and diffuse natural light from the skylights and west-facing curtainwall. The fins also introduce a planar quality of lightness, or weightlessness, that’s repeated in several other floating forms used throughout the chapel building.
The exterior cladding is an architectural precast concrete cast in molds made from split-faced Italian travertine. The bell tower is comprised of two slender walls 42 feet high, slightly offset from one another, with five chrome-plated bronze chimes nestled between the walls. The precast, along with the chapel building’s rhythmically vertical forms, respond to the existing campus architectural aesthetic, while the bell tower – which stands at the same height as the library – visually anchors the chapel to the library across the lawn.
While the sanctuary is asymmetrical - the processional walkway slopes down to the space, which is sited at the elevation of the west garden - the space is balanced and contemplative. With keen attention to the aesthetic and spiritual qualities of curving and planar forms, the architect-designed liturgical furniture and pre-manufactured chairs are seamlessly integrated into the overall composition. With its warmth and luminosity, the chapel has become a site of pilgrimage, drawing people of diverse faiths seeking its embrace for worship and meditation.

Owner
United Theological Seminary

Architect
HGA Architects and Engineers   
www.hga.com
Principal:
Gary Reetz AIA
Project Manager and Project Architect:
John Cook AIA
Project Designer:
Joan Soranno AIA
Architect:
Steven Dwyer AIA, LEED AP

Engineer(s)
Mechanical, Electrical, Civil:
HGA Architects and Engineers   
Structural:
HGA Architects and Engineers   

Consultant(s)
Landscape Architecture:
Coen + Partners
Acoustics:
Kirkegaard Associates
Lighting:
Schuler Shook
Millwork:
Wilkie Sanderson
Architectural Precast:
Artstone
Curtainwall:
MERO Structures

Contractor(s)
M.A. Mortenson Company

Photographer(s)
© Paul Warchol Photography
www.warcholphotography.com

Westchester Reform Temple, Scarsdale, N.Y.
Rogers Marvel Architects, PLLC

Drawings: © Rogers Marvel Architects, PLLC.

This project for Westchester Reform Temple includes a new Sanctuary and the renovation of their existing Sanctuary to create new classroom spaces and a new study center for the religious school. 

The suburban site is re-imagined as a campus.  To the West is the entry court, the connection to the Community and the Public Realm.  To the East is the Sanctuary Garden, the connection to the Spiritual Realm.  The new Sanctuary building mediates this transition from Public to Private, from Temporal to Spiritual.  

The Interior of the new structure is comprised of wood panels organized in a progression of intersecting steps moving from West to East, representing cycles of life and the marking of time in the temporal world.  Towards the East, the Sanctuary Garden is visible but not accessible through a translucent membrane, a glass wall imagined as the threshold through which we travel only in spirit.  The East window incorporates mirrored panels that offer a collage of reflected views, merging fractured images of the congregation with the sky and the garden.  This visual complexity is the focus for contemplation; a metaphor for the complex expansive yet inwardly focused spiritual experience. 

Owner
Westchester Reform Temple

Architect
Rogers Marvel Architects
www.rogersmarvel.com
Principal: Rob Rogers
Associate: Alissa Bucher
Project Team: Gary Machicek, Josh Kaplan, Chris Dameron, Lissa So, Elena Brescia

Engineer(s)
Mechanical:
Collado Engineering
Structural:
Robert Silman Associates,P.C.
Civil:
Langan Engineering and Environmental Design

Consultant(s)
LEED: Buro Happold Consulting Engineers
Landscape: Dirtworks, Inc.
Lighting: Jim Conti Lighting Design
Acoustics: Jaffe
Bent Art Glass: Foxfire Glass and TriPyramid Structures, Inc.

Drawings
All renderings, illustrations, and diagrams generated and supplied by Rogers Marvel Architects, PLLC.

Center Of Gravity Foundation Hall, Jemez, NM
Predock Frane Architects

Photography: © Jason Predock

The Center of Gravity Foundation Hall for the Bodhi Mandala Zen Center serves as the primary teaching and meditation hall for the existing Zen Buddhist Compound.  It is located in a high mountain river valley in Northern New Mexico with abundant geothermal activity below the site.  The cliffs of the valley are a rosy pink sculpted sandstone. The tin roofed, masonry, existing buildings, were built from the turn of the century thru the 1950’s, and were originally used as a Boy Scout camp.
Conceptually, the project embraces oppositions; intersecting two embracing boxes - one of heaviness (rammed earth) and the other of lightness (polycarbonate on timberstrand) to define the transition from exterior to interior, and form the interior volume of the hall. The light translucent West side “glows” with light as the sun sets over the mountains. The East side cradles the space with thick earthen walls, partially containing the ‘light’ box.  A folded, stealth like metal roof plane hovers over the space supported by glulam beams and purlins. Primarily supported along the North and South ends, the East and West edges of the roof plane float above the walls, with clear glass filling this void. The cantilevers of this roof plane define raised exterior paths for walking meditation, and divert rainwater into a catchment for irrigation. Sliding panels along the East side open to reveal a 36’ wide aperture with foreground views onto a garden and background views toward the reddish mountains beyond.
Light structures and ritualizes the space. Dawn light enters the space thru sheets of glass turned on edge, which are sandwiched into the wooden sliding panels. As the sun moves overhead, ambient light from a continuous slot below the roof and thru the polycarbonate panels creates an even halo within the building. As the sun moves into the far West, between the roof overhang and the cliff horizon, the west walls come alive, glowing with amber hues. As the sun sets, recessed lights begin to create an interior glow that makes the building a “lantern” at night.
The ritual and formality of traditional Zen practice is respected while the architecture establishes a new direction for the meeting of two foreign cultures. Monks and students “slip” between the earth walls and the layered polycarbonate walls as they enter the hall from opposite sides. The Roshi (teacher) enters from the East and sits in a “Teisho” chair facing the Buddha located within the blackened budsudon to the West. Monks sit on the North side facing the students in training on the South side. Beyond the intense teaching seminars, ceremonies like weddings and funerals would also take place in the hall. 
Environmentally, the project operates at several different levels. The heating and cooling is both passive and active. Passively, the thick compressed earth walls act as thermal composites, keeping unwanted summer heat out during the day and re-radiating it at night. In the winter the mass of the 26-inch thick earth walls and multi-layer polycarbonate walls limit thermal transfer. Cantilevered roof edges, up to 14 feet deep, block summer sun and allow the lower winter sun angle to radiate through the polycarbonate wall. Cooling works effectively via cross ventilation by opening the 36 feet of sliding panels to the east and the entry doors to the west, capturing natural prevailing breezes.  Heat is generated actively during the winter by geothermal water that is captured on the site, passed thru a heat exchanger, and radiated along the building’s interior perimeter.  Artificial lighting is kept to a minimum with adequate light levels for reading during most of the daylight hours via the large translucent walls and glazed eaves. Materially, the earth for the walls was found locally at a large civil construction site. It echoes the textures and hues of the surrounding cliffs. Recycled timberstrand members are spaced on a 3-feet module, simultaneously saving material and corresponding to the tatami module of the floor.
Within its context of rural New Mexico, the Bodhi Center and the Foundation Hall serve more than the Buddhist’s needs. The center has a 30-year history of social outreach. The community it resides in is the antithesis of more well-known and affluent New Mexico communities like Santa Fe or Taos. Jemez Springs has very few public gathering spaces and therefore the building operates as a community-meeting place, regularly hosting various local organizations. Likewise the building serves larger communities throughout the United States, regularly drawing people from across the country for meetings and retreats.

Owner
Bodhi Manda Zen Retreat

Architect
Predock Frane Architects          
www.predockfrane.com
Partner:
Hadrian Predock
Partner:
John Frane

Contractor(s)
Paul Kenderdine Construction

Photographer(s)
© Jason Predock        

Meditation House, Bosques de las Lomas, Mexico City, Mexico
Pascal Arquitectos

Photography: © Víctor Benítez Drawings: © Pascal Arquitectos

This is a project with very strong emotional implications. We had to understand the mood of the user, who at such a moment would not care much for an aesthetical analysis of a place, but at the same time we wanted to create a space that can generate a spiritual mood; for this we referred to ancient buildings that were designed for this specific purpose including the Egyptian “Mastabas” and Mayan buildings in Palenque.
Religious rules and buildings codes in the Jewish Religion are strict for these kinds of places, and we were guided by several groups of Rabbis in this matter.
A project of this nature must encourage introspection and peaceful visual harmony through a discrete use of materials and lighting. The building is located in a residential area and has been planned as an isolated structure within its surroundings to create an indoor illuminated yard. The buildings façade is completely covered by flamed granite.
The building welcomes visitors with a 6´4” wide and 30´ high triangular shaped wooden door which leads to an access tunnel in the same shape, creating a solemn atmosphere as you enter. The darkening experience at the entrance ends when the hallway opens into a large double height granite hall illuminated by the northern light coming from the indoor courtyard.  A tall Dracaena is at the center and a symbolical abstract sculpture by artist Saul Kaminer is the only artwork piece for decoration.
No furniture was used inside, only a floating bench surrounding the room that is made out of the same wood that is used in the building. The bench It also serves to hide all of the air conditioning, speakers and recessed lighting which adds drama to the space. The rooms show no added ornament , only the light and shade playing on the granite volumes. The ceiling is made of dark cumaru wood and floats without touching the walls. The adjacent skylight further highlights the detail.

Owner
Monte Sinai

Architect
Pascal Arquitectos
www.pascalarquitectos.com
Arch. Gerard Pascal
Arch. Carlos Pascal

Associated Architect
Arch. Rafael Salame

Engineer(s)
Alonso García Hermanos y Asociados, S.C.

Contractor(s)
Arch. Rafael Salame

Photographer(s)
© Víctor Benítez

MEGAchurch, New York, NY
Office Feuerman, llc

Drawings: © William Feuerman

If the space presently occupied by Willow Creek Community Church, one of the largest megachurches in America, were housed on the current site of the Empire State Building, it would rise 171 stories. Almost 5 million square feet would be required for car parking alone.
MEGAchurch, a proposed design for a 200,000-square-foot worship space in New York City, between 175th and 176th Streets, adapts the megachurch—a typology that is traditionally suburban and car-centered—to fit an urban and pedestrian-centered environment.
The project morphs the horizontal, mall-like space of a typical megachurch into a vertical tower. MEGAchurch responds to the surrounding religious institutions, pedestrian and vehicular conditions on the site, as well as to the prescribed volumetric and zoning constraints. A gradated perforated skin encloses the 200,000-square-foot complex. The tower features a "MEGAvator," a giant elevator that transports 3,600 people to a chapel in the sky.

Owner
Speculative Project

Designer
Office Feuerman, llc
www.officefeuerman.com
Project Team:
William Feuerman
Credit:
Jeannie Kim
Kate Ferguson
Jason Logan
Anthony Treu

Drawing(s)
© William Feuerman

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