Fountain Street Church - Art and Architecture

Art and Architecture

Fountain Street’s original American Gothic church building, constructed in 1877, was destroyed by a fire in 1917. Under the leadership of senior minister, Rev. Alfred Wesley Wishart, a new church was designed and built over the next seven years. The Italian Romanesque sanctuary was dedicated in February 1924 with seating for approximately 1,500.

The present sanctuary reflects the beginnings of historic Christian church design. Rev. Wishart envisioned a basilica that “encompassed the refinements of art, the inspiration of character, and the techniques of science” and spoke of a church with “majestic architectural lines, color, form and shape in its tapestries, wood carvings, stonework, intricate mosaics, light, and glass”—all which were to be “symbols born of high purpose with a social point of view.”

Among the artwork which pervades the entire church building are Byzantine-styled oil-painted effigies, murals, coffered walnut and mosaic ceilings, Mercer-tiled floors, Romanesque stone columns and arcades, numerous mosaics (including Raphael’s “Madonna of the Chair”, reproduced by Salviati of Venice), rare furniture artifacts, painted glass, and an Alden B. Dow-designed chapel. A memorial tower room situated between the narthex and the main lobby is dedicated to soldiers who lost their lives in World War I and features a mosaic and gold-leaf domed-ceiling which portrays four guardian angels symbolizing “Justice, Liberty, Peace and Fraternity.”