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Architecture
This excerpt is abridged from Percy Preston, Jr.’s
St. Bartholomew’s Church: An Architectural Tour. The full guide is available for sale at St. Bart’s and Gift Shop, located in the narthex (church lobby).
Overview
Today’s St. Bartholomew’s, the church's third location in New York City, opened in 1918. The dome and much of the interior decoration were added in 1929-30; the adjacent Community House dates from 1927. The current St. Bart’s was built to replace an earlier structure located on Madison Avenue at 44th Street. The first St. Bartholomew’s was further downtown, at the corner of Great Jones Street and Lafayette Place. Neither building is still standing.
Two factors influenced the choice of style for the present church: the need to provide a harmonious setting for the Romanesque portal with its three sets of bronze doors (a part of the previous Madison Avenue church), and the desire for a space in which everyone could both see and hear the preacher. Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue, the architect, referred to the present building as Romanesque, but Byzantine influences are also apparent, especially in the decoration.
The Dome
Surprisingly, the dome, the church's signature feature, was not part of the original design. Architect Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue had planned a great central tower at the culmination of the building's exterior. Financial considerations later obliged Goodhue to scale back his design, and the tower was eliminated. When St. Bartholomew’s opened its doors in 1918, a low roof covered the central crossing. After Goodhue’s death in 1924, his associates adapted his design for the dome of the California State Building (Panama-California Exposition, San Diego, 1911–1915) for St. Bartholomew’s. The dome, which was completed in 1930, is divided into eight sections, each covered with a marble mosaic cross. The slender “Cross of Triumph” stands atop the dome, 148 feet above street level.
The Portal
The triple portal and three sets of bronze doors (Park Avenue between 50th and 51st Street) were designed by Stanford White as a memorial to Cornelius Vanderbilt II and incorporated into the previous St. Bartholomew's Church in 1903. The archivolts are constructed of limestone, the 24 columns of Cippolino marble, the tympana and lintels of white marble, the recessed panels behind the statues of Alps greenstone, and the wainscoting of Egyptian porphery, which has a reddish hue. The collect for St. Bartholomew's Day is inscribed across the top of the portal.
The Large Frieze and Statuary
Andrew O'Connor, sculptor
The large frieze containing the three arches (Park Avenue) depicts events from the Old and New Testament. On the north side: the kings from the East, the flight into Egypt, the betrayal of Jesus, and St. John the Baptist. On the south side: Adam and Eve, the expulsion from Eden, the murder of Abel, and the enslaved Israelites freed by Moses. The figures atop the two columns that flank the center doors are Elijah on the north and Moses on the south. Between the doors and recessed behind the columns are the figures of four prophets (north to south): Isaiah with sword and book, Elijah with his chariot, Jeremiah holding his staff, and Moses with the Law on tablets of stone.
Northern Doorway
Herbert Adams, sculptor
The figures in the tympanum over the doorway represent the Christ Child and his mother, with angels on either side. The lintel is carved with a frieze depicting Jesus' followers carrying his body to the grave. The four central panels represented on the doors are St. Peter, St. Andrew, St. Barnabas, and St. Paul. The upper panels show the Transfiguration and Saul's conversion on the road to Damascus. The lower panels represent the apostles at work: St. Peter addressing the centurion's family and the conversion of Lydia by St. Paul at Philippi.
Center Doorway
Daniel Hester French and Andrew O'Connor, sculptors
The tympanum over the doorway represents the Coronation of Christ the King. Below this is a frieze representing the crucifixion. Prophecies from the Book of Isaiah are inscribed above and below the frieze. The center panels of the doors depict the four evangelists: St. Matthew, St. Mark, St. Luke, and St. John. With him are smaller figures of the prophets Jeremiah, Nehemiah, Isaiah, and Daniel, whose writings the Gospel narratives most clearly culminate. Above and below are figures of the twelve sibyls, part of a tradition dating to the Middle Ages in portraying them as prophetesses who uttered Messianic testimony in pagan lands.
Southern Doorway
Philip Martiny, sculptor
Jesus and St. John the Baptist in their infancy are depicted in the tympanum. The frieze below shows Jesus carrying the cross on the way to Calvary. The door's four central figures are St. Philip, St. James, St. Andrew, and St. Bartholomew. The upper panels depict Pentecost and the Ascension; in the lower, Judas betrays his master and St. Peter receives keys representing the Church. The inscriptions are taken from the Book of Revelation and the Psalms.
Interior of the Church, General Aspects
The church is built in the traditional cruciform pattern (in the shape of a cross), with the altar located at the "top" facing east. The structural members of the church are stone and marble veneer over concrete. The greater part of the plane surfaces are covered with rough, coffee-colored Guastavino acoustic tile, contrasted with lighter colored marble used in the choir and lower part of the apse. The church has a normal seating capacity of 1250, including balconies in both transepts.
The Chancel
Choir stalls and clergy seats are located on either side of the aisle. Originally from the Madison Avenue Church, they are made of carved and inlaid wood. The chancel pavement, of marble and mosaic, was also brought from the old church. The chancel screens behind the choir stalls are made of walnut, with inlays of vari-colored woods. The inlaid shields on the north side depict Isaiah's symbolic language in describing the kingdom of God. Also depicted are swords beaten into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks. The window on the south chancel bay, above the organ, contains glass brought from the old church. Perhaps the chancel's most striking feature, immediately visible upon entering the sanctuary, is the glass mosaic that begins on the clerestory level and continues around the arch, with the cross at its center. The mosaic was designed by Hildreth Meire, who also designed the mosaics in the narthex.
The Sanctuary
The sanctuary is separated from the choir by a bow-shaped altar rail made of yellow Siena marble and composed of ten panels carved in geometric designs. Narrow marble mosaics, representing alternately the vine and the wheat, symbols of the Holy Communion, are inlaid between the panels.
The opening of the apse is flanked by twelve slender marble columns of various colors, three on either side of the lower level and the same number directly above them on the clerestory level. The wall of the apse on the lower level is lined with panels of Siena Fleuri marble, split and matched to form designs symmetrical with its veining. Directly behind the altar is a wide panel of Jaune Benou marble from France, in which is inlaid a large cross of white marble.
Glasswork: Reynolds, Francis, and Rohnstock (Boston, Massachusetts)
Installed in 1943, memory of Lila Vanderbilt Field
In the wall of the south transept, the Sanctus window, measuring twenty-four feet in diameter, is constructed in the form of a wheel. A stone cross is enclosed in a circle in the window's center, from which sixteen limestone shafts radiate outward. Around the periphery the stone tracery is cut in circular and semi-circular pattern, appropriate to the church's Romanesque architecture. The glass in the window depicts the glory of the Church's hymn of adoration, the Sanctus.
The window is organized in concentric circles. Rays of golden light, emanating from the center, represent Almighty God. Moving outward, the next portion shows standing figures of the various orders of angels: Seraphim, Cherubim, Archangels, and Thrones, placed alternately on blue and red backgrounds. Next in order is the company of priests, represented in circles, each surrounded by hosts of red-winged seraphim, symbolic of those yet unborn. Approaching the circle's perimeter, sixteen quadrangular-shaped openings contain angels in attributes of prayer. In the very outer circle, sixteen pear-shaped openings show blue-winged cherubs, completing the iconography of the heavenly choir.
The Chapel
Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue designed the chapel (adjacent to the church on the south) for the children of the parish. For this reason the pews are smaller than those in the church, and much of the chapel's decoration is concerned with the childhood of Jesus and other biblical personalities. The bronze doors which lead out onto Park Avenue were modeled by Albert Stewart. On the left is the figure of St. John the Baptist as a young boy; on the right is the figure of Jesus at a similar age. Above and below these central figures are symbols of the four evangelists: the winged man (St. Matthew), the winged ox (St. Luke), the winged lion (St. Mark), and the eagle (St. John). The lintel above the doorway bears a passage from Isaiah: "All the children shall be taught of the Lord; and great shall be the peace of the children." Today, parishioners of all ages enjoy the chapel, which is the venue for weekday worship and the early Sunday Eucharist, as well as smaller worship services and recitals throughout the year.
These pages offer only a taste of St. Bartholomew's magnificent architectural features. St. Bartholomew's archivist, Percy Preston, Jr., has compiled an detailed architectural tour in book form, available at St. Bartholomew's Book & Gift Shop.
To arrange a tour of St. Bartholomew's Church, contact St. Bart's Central at 212-378-0222 or central@stbarts.org.
Related pages of interest:
St. Bartholomew’s History
The Organ |
