Church Architecture

Brooklyn in the mid-1800s was known as the “City of the Churches,” where the steeples towered high above the residential homes and farms.  These churches symbolized the lack of crime, corruption, and sins that separated Brooklyn from New York City.  One of the neighborhoods that exemplified the religious revival was Brooklyn Heights.  Today, the Grace Church, the Plymouth Church, Church of St. Ann and the Holy Episcopal characterize the influence of the church members’ religious beliefs on their architecture.

Grace Church

During the 1800s, the Gothic Revival swept the United States and Great Britain.  The resulting "English Parish Church" aimed to restore wonder and seriousness to worship.  This was done to personify the grandeur of its members, which included the Pierreponts and many other prominent families of the time.  Furthermore, the church represented the solemnity of the worshippers.  The walls were decorated quotations from the Bible, and the stained glass windows depicted Biblical events.  Its architect, Richard Upjohn decided to favor the 15th century Perpendicular style for the frame, mainly because it was cheaper, but still striking.  Upjohn also designed a wooden ceiling that stabilized the structure instead of using plaster to simulate the facade of true stone vaulting.  The most Gothic characteristics were the well-defined mass of the chancel and the many-sided corner tower that rises to an “ogee-shaped spire.”  Grace Church was the epitome of the Gothic Revival, but other churches that followed it would have Gothic characteristics as well. 

Church of St. Ann’s & Holy Trinity Church

St. Ann’s and the Holy Trinity Church also incorporated Gothic Revival architecture.  The “polychromatic” effects of the pattern of different stone colors distinguish St. Ann’s Church from other similar structures.  Its central section ascends with very narrow twin towers and in the center of the section is an imposing stained glass pointed window.  The stepped buttresses bordering the central entrance accentuate the steep steps that lead to the three entrances.  In 1969, the Packer Collegiate Institute bought the church and merged it with the Holy Trinity Church to form the Church of St. Ann and the Holy Trinity.  A 295-foot high tower characterized the Holy Trinity Church, with an eleven-foot high cross that was mounted on top.  The exterior is of red sandstone with enlarged buttresses and peaks.  Similar to Grace Church, the interior is highlighted by lierne vaulting, using “wood-frame plaster vaults.”  However, the church’s greatest assets are the sixty stained glass windows, twenty by forty feet.  The artist William Jay Bolton depicted Renaissance themes that symbolized spiritual “radiance.”  However, elsewhere at that time among some Protestant sects, both religious practice and church architecture became simpler.  

The Plymouth Church

In the early 1800s, the “preaching churches,” resembling meetinghouses of New England, spread to other parts of the United States.  One of them was built in Brooklyn Heights in 1849, the Plymouth Church.  Joseph C. Wells, its architect, basically designed a square building with round corners and the interior resembled more of an auditorium rather than what was traditionally considered a church.  In addition, the interior design allowed the congregation to “see and hear” the preacher, the most renowned being Henry Ward Beecher.  The plain appearance of the church represented the congregation’s humbleness before God, which was seen as being more “intimate” with Him.  Furthermore, the stained glass windows had the “History of Puritanism and Its Influence Upon the Institutions and People of the Republic” as the theme, accentuating the simplicity and devoutness of the church members.

These landmark churches characterized 19th century Brooklyn as the “City of the Churches.”  The Gothic Revival Architecture of Grace Church, Church of St. Ann’s and the Holy Trinity awed people while the simplicity of the Plymouth Church humbled its worshippers.  Despite their differences, the architecture of each of these churches reflected the beliefs and views of their congregants.