West-Park Presbyterian Church
Encyclopedia
West-Park Presbyterian Church is a Romanesque Revival Presbyterian church located on the corner of Amsterdam Avenue at 86th Street
on Manhattan's Upper West Side
, New York City
, consisting of a main sanctuary and chapel.
The congregation was founded in 1852 as the 84th Street Presbyterian Church, building its first chapel of timber in 1854 on 84th Street and West End Avenue, to designs by one of the city’s most prominent architects, Prague-born Leopold Eidlitz
. The church changed its name to Park Presbyterian Church in 1887. The name became West-Park Presbyterian when the midtown West Presbyterian Church (New York City)
(founded 1823) merged with Park Presbyterian in 1911.
, one wealthy new pastor (from 1879), Anson Phelps Atterbury (1855–1931), proposed a grand church in the hopes that the congregation would expand with the expected increases to the neighborhood that the new IRT
lines along Broadway would bring. That pastor commissioned Leopold Eidlitz
to build a diminutive midblock brick Romanesque Revival chapel in 1884, a style Eidlitz described as "muscular" Romanesque and considered appropriate to an evangelical Protestant church. After a further $100,000 was raised, the main sanctuary was built in 1889-90 on the abutting corner site, to designs by Henry Franklin Kilburn
in intricately carved brown and red sandstone in a stylistic continuation of Eidlitz's Romanesque chapel but re-cladding that brick chapel in sandstone and adding an offset diminutive tower. The corner features a giant ribbed bell-domed belltower, which dominates the neighborhood and if not for the competing heights of apartment towers “would be one of the West Side’s loveliest landmarks,” according to the AIA Guide to NYC.
In the 1980s, the church was re-pointed with cement, which has resulted in substantial erosion of the soft sandstone. Around the same time, the church installed a new elevator for handicap accessibility in the parish house (the original chapel).
In the early 2000s, the congregation hired a developer to address their financial situation, diminished attendance, and role in society. Their findings proposed the replacement of the complex with an eighteen- to twenty-three-story residential tower and a smaller new corner glass church, designed by the architectural firm of Franke, Gottsegen & Cox. The design featured a “prow-shaped base of stone,” with a sweeping 125-foot glass carillon tower providing “a luminous well of light.” The current social outreach and education facilities would be doubled and the modern design, the architects asserted, would create a sense of refuge and “communitarian communality.” The architects described the design: "...the crisscrossing of the structure, like a canopy of trees, but you won’t be able to see the top, which we think is an expression of sacredness,” adding, “the sanctuary is very flexible and interfaith use is possible so that space can be shared with other denominations.”
In response, activists organized the “Friends of West-Park” to protest the development while concurrently working toward a viable alternative plan as well as funds. The group principally feared the loss of air and light with the new tower. The co-chairman of Friends of West-Park stated that the group was not interested “in telling the church that it had to maintain itself for the community good without the community taking some role [but instead they] formed a development company capable of doing what [they] say and working on a partnership with the church.” The "Friends" suggested selling Eidlitz's chapel for redevelopment to a non-profit, probably a school, to offset the cost of renovation, with neighboring buildings preparing to lease air rights. Most of the external walls would be preserved, restoring the sandstone and stained glass but not the original roof shape nor the forty-foot interior, which would be gutted. Its sanctuary would be raised to gallery level and fitted with movable seating; since divided windows already exist, the alteration would not be externally evident, leaving the commercially ideal ground floor for other uses, possibly social outreach or educational. One architect responsible for the sympathetic second plan explained that “successful rehabilitation allows the character and original intent of the first architect to come through. So the question is, If not every square inch is sacred turf, how much modification can the structure bear without losing what makes it special?” Rev. Brashear of West-Park was quoted as receptive to the community input but stated that the congregation, trustees, and various levels of the Presbytery are still deciding the unprotected church’s fate.
The congregation moved to share space in 2008 with the neighboring Renaissance Revival-styled, Saints Paul and Andrew United Methodist Church (1897), protected as a city landmark and itself a product of a 1937 denominational merger.
The church was finally declared a landmark by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission
on January 12, 2010.
86th Street (Manhattan)
86th Street is a major two-way street in the Upper East Side and Upper West Side of the New York City borough of Manhattan.On the West Side its continuous cliff-wall of apartment blocks includng The Belnord is broken by two contrasting landmarked churches at prominent corner sites, the Tuscan...
on Manhattan's Upper West Side
Upper West Side
The Upper West Side is a neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan, New York City, that lies between Central Park and the Hudson River and between West 59th Street and West 125th Street...
, New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, consisting of a main sanctuary and chapel.
Congregation history
Leopold Eidlitz
Leopold Eidlitz was a prominent New York architect best known for his work on the New York State Capitol , as well as "Iranistan" , P. T. Barnum's house in Bridgeport, Connecticut; St. Peter's Church, on Westchester Avenue at St...
. The church changed its name to Park Presbyterian Church in 1887. The name became West-Park Presbyterian when the midtown West Presbyterian Church (New York City)
West Presbyterian Church (New York City)
West Presbyterian Church was a former Presbyterian church located at 31 West 42nd Street. Founded 1829 as North Presbyterian Church , "Within a few years [in the late 1830s] it changed its name to West Presbyterian Church." "In 1860, following the northward movement of Manhattan’s population, [the...
(founded 1823) merged with Park Presbyterian in 1911.
Present church building
The small congregation moved north in uptown Manhattan a number of times. Upon moving to the Upper West SideUpper West Side
The Upper West Side is a neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan, New York City, that lies between Central Park and the Hudson River and between West 59th Street and West 125th Street...
, one wealthy new pastor (from 1879), Anson Phelps Atterbury (1855–1931), proposed a grand church in the hopes that the congregation would expand with the expected increases to the neighborhood that the new IRT
IRT
IRT may refer to:* Immunoreactive trypsinogen, used as a newborn screening test for cystic fibrosis* Indiana Repertory Theatre, a theatre in Indianapolis, Indiana...
lines along Broadway would bring. That pastor commissioned Leopold Eidlitz
Leopold Eidlitz
Leopold Eidlitz was a prominent New York architect best known for his work on the New York State Capitol , as well as "Iranistan" , P. T. Barnum's house in Bridgeport, Connecticut; St. Peter's Church, on Westchester Avenue at St...
to build a diminutive midblock brick Romanesque Revival chapel in 1884, a style Eidlitz described as "muscular" Romanesque and considered appropriate to an evangelical Protestant church. After a further $100,000 was raised, the main sanctuary was built in 1889-90 on the abutting corner site, to designs by Henry Franklin Kilburn
Henry Franklin Kilburn
Henry Franklin Kilburn, FAIA, was an American architect active in late-nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century New York City who is particularly associated with church architecture...
in intricately carved brown and red sandstone in a stylistic continuation of Eidlitz's Romanesque chapel but re-cladding that brick chapel in sandstone and adding an offset diminutive tower. The corner features a giant ribbed bell-domed belltower, which dominates the neighborhood and if not for the competing heights of apartment towers “would be one of the West Side’s loveliest landmarks,” according to the AIA Guide to NYC.
Preservation
In the early 2000s, the congregation hired a developer to address their financial situation, diminished attendance, and role in society. Their findings proposed the replacement of the complex with an eighteen- to twenty-three-story residential tower and a smaller new corner glass church, designed by the architectural firm of Franke, Gottsegen & Cox. The design featured a “prow-shaped base of stone,” with a sweeping 125-foot glass carillon tower providing “a luminous well of light.” The current social outreach and education facilities would be doubled and the modern design, the architects asserted, would create a sense of refuge and “communitarian communality.” The architects described the design: "...the crisscrossing of the structure, like a canopy of trees, but you won’t be able to see the top, which we think is an expression of sacredness,” adding, “the sanctuary is very flexible and interfaith use is possible so that space can be shared with other denominations.”
In response, activists organized the “Friends of West-Park” to protest the development while concurrently working toward a viable alternative plan as well as funds. The group principally feared the loss of air and light with the new tower. The co-chairman of Friends of West-Park stated that the group was not interested “in telling the church that it had to maintain itself for the community good without the community taking some role [but instead they] formed a development company capable of doing what [they] say and working on a partnership with the church.” The "Friends" suggested selling Eidlitz's chapel for redevelopment to a non-profit, probably a school, to offset the cost of renovation, with neighboring buildings preparing to lease air rights. Most of the external walls would be preserved, restoring the sandstone and stained glass but not the original roof shape nor the forty-foot interior, which would be gutted. Its sanctuary would be raised to gallery level and fitted with movable seating; since divided windows already exist, the alteration would not be externally evident, leaving the commercially ideal ground floor for other uses, possibly social outreach or educational. One architect responsible for the sympathetic second plan explained that “successful rehabilitation allows the character and original intent of the first architect to come through. So the question is, If not every square inch is sacred turf, how much modification can the structure bear without losing what makes it special?” Rev. Brashear of West-Park was quoted as receptive to the community input but stated that the congregation, trustees, and various levels of the Presbytery are still deciding the unprotected church’s fate.
The congregation moved to share space in 2008 with the neighboring Renaissance Revival-styled, Saints Paul and Andrew United Methodist Church (1897), protected as a city landmark and itself a product of a 1937 denominational merger.
The church was finally declared a landmark by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission
New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission
The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission is the New York City agency charged with administering the city's Landmarks Preservation Law. The Commission was created in April 1965 by Mayor Robert F. Wagner following the destruction of Pennsylvania Station the previous year to make way for...
on January 12, 2010.