urbanSTL

It looks like a hospital chapel.

Union Memorial United Methodist Church, 1141 Belt Ave, near Page and Bartmer.

symphonicpoet wrote: ↑

Sep 09, 2018

I was trying to decide between churches and mid-century modernism myself, so . . . I'll follow your lead and do both:

the chapel at Lambert

Urban Dilettante for the win!

There are some hospital chapels on my list, actually. Just . . . haven't gotten them yet. Was worried I was going to have to post a clue but man, would it be a trick to find one that wasn't too obvious. Thank you for solving the problem for me UD.

All right, one at a time now. He's some more conventional revivalist religious architecture:

My gut tells me that's somewhere on the campus of Concordia Seminary.

The style is not wrong, but I don't think there's anything on Concordia's campus that's simultansouely so bricky and gothic revival with that modern twist. Either it's brick and straight up contemporary or it's revivalesque in stone. Been a while, I grant, but this is elsewhere in any case.

A different view of the same structure. Ordinary parish grade.

Every church this reminds me of is made of stone, not brick. Can you give another clue?

That's . . . uh . . . much bigger than strictly necessary. But it does give you a nice detail or two that might help. Since it's one more revival church in a city with dozens, or maybe hundreds of them.

St. Elizabeth Mother of John the Baptist Catholic Church at Shreve and Carter in Penrose!

I realized that I have a secret weapon, a flickr album with 250+ photos of STL Churches... Even if I'd consulted it earlier though, I wouldn't have gotten this one. There truly are so many similar churches in STL! I snapped this one back in 2013:

That is correct! Which is surprising for Apple Maps!!

STLExplorer . . .

Correct, of course. St. Bets, Mother of Dunkin Jack. Not quite as famous as the Franks, but a lovely little church, nevertheless. And yes, we have more than our fair share of similar ones.

And well done Shad. I was still searching through my list of parks with ponds. Scouring around Fairgrounds Park when I saw you'd answered. There's some spots around both Benton and Fairgrounds that are . . . close . . . but not quite correct.

Anyway, if you want to go I'll leave it to you, Shad, otherwise I can do some non-church Midcentury Mod.

How 'bout this?

I hate to admit this, since that's a fairly distinctive building and I'd swear I've seen it. But so far . . . I am skunked. I've even been scouring through Mark Abeln's photography (Rome of the West) trying to find it and I'm having zero luck. There are a fair few Italianate churches around town, but . . . not that many. I'll keep looking. I'm enjoying the challenge. But that's why it's silent. Not because we don't care. I do. You just have me stumped.

(At the moment I'm pursuing the idea that the church isn't Catholic, as surprising as that might seem. Not that it's gotten me anywhere, but . . . You have to try something.)

I can't think of the name of this church, but it's at the eastern end of Fountain Place, just east of Kingshighway.

We have a winner! Southwest corner of Fountain Park. Sorry, I don't actually know the current or original name. I was driving around one day and was impressed by this tall tower poking up like some old Italian hill town.

^That is not what I expected the rest of that building to look like! I swear, I scanned right past it when I was looking over the map in desperation. I don't think I would have found it through Google foo. Too many mistaken assumptions.

Centennial Christian Church, for those who are curious. Disciples of Christ. Not sure of the history before that, but it looks like it was always congregational now that I see the whole thing. Only the tower and the doorway look Catholic.

Some history, courtesy of Built St. Louis: https://www.builtstlouis.net/northside/ ... hurch.html

Was congregational from the get-go.

A bit more on the architect from the city's own website: https://dynamic.stlouis-mo.gov/history/ ... ter_ID=723

(He apparently designed the "rotunda" of city hall. Why do people insist on calling square things rotundas, I ask you? It's a lobby. It ain't a rotunda. Sorry. I keep a peave or two around as pets. I think that one just got loose.)

Anyway, well played! It's been a dang fun search, even if I didn't find it. Looking through lists of St. Louis churches is never a waste of time. Just when you think you've seen it all . . .

Triple-A Building on Lindell.

And here I thought that one was going to be hard. So I went and took more pictures of the thing. After you answered the question, apparently. Indeed, the AAA building, which doubles as the local license bureau.

Cool building (and my favorite license office); and we almost lost it a couple of years ago.

Next up:

The Metropolitan building lobby. (maybe!)

(Every time I see this thread title I read "the hell" into it. Where the hell...?)