Saturday, December 15, 2018

Photo of the Day: St. Thomas Episcopal Church, Fifth Avenue, NYC


When my company was located at the Rolex Building, I used to pass by the house of worship located catty-corner from it on Fifth Avenue and 53rd Street, St. Thomas Episcopal Church. The fourth church for the parish, it replaced a prior structure destroyed in a 1905 fire. 

Many other congregations might not have recovered from a blaze that consumed interiors by John LaFarge and sculptures by Augustus St. Gaudens. But architect Ralph Adams Cram announced that the new structure would probably be “the most expensive church per square foot built thus far in the United States.” St. Thomas rebuilt rapidly, with the first service in its new home being held Oct. 4, 1913. 

Like St. Patrick’s Cathedral a few blocks to the south, St. Thomas, with its French High Gothic architectural style, stands out from the modernist, glass-and-steel cathedrals of commerce that now populate Fifth Avenue. From its triple-arched entrance way to its stone quarried from Kentucky, it awes even from the outside—an impression only enhanced by a preservation project completed a year ago that saw restoration of its stained glass windows and the cleaning of its facade.

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