Saint Peter's Lutheran Church of Manhattan

BUILT

1977

RELIGIOUS DENOMINATION/AFFILIATION

Lutheran, Metropolitan New York Synod

INTERESTING FACTS

  • The interior, designed by Vignelli Associates, invites us in, down and up, placing us in a paradox -- in the earth but heavenward, protected while open to the light, human while grand and elevated with a sense of both the cosmos and the womb - a womb of rebirth. It is a place of resurrection where we are born in a new spirit. When the environment outside is a dark cave of reflected shadows reminding us of our disintegration, Saint Peter's calls us into a resplendent sanctuary of God's love.

  • The organ, built by Johannes Klais of Bonn, Germany, is designed to be a work of art designed visually and tonally to fit the sanctuary. The free-standing case, designed by Joseph Schafer, is of red oak. It is 18 feet square, 4 feet deep and is set at a 45 degree angle to the walls of the sanctuary. After 20 years of continuous use, the organ was cleaned and revoiced in 2000 by its builder, Klais Orgelbau.

  • According to LeMessurier, in 1978 an undergraduate architecture student contacted him with a bold claim about LeMessurier’s building: that Citicorp Center could blow over in the wind. The student was studying Citicorp Center and had found that the building was particularly vulnerable to quartering winds (winds that strike the building at its corners). Normally, buildings are strongest at their corners, and it’s the perpendicular winds. LeMessurier had accounted for the perpendicular winds, but not the quartering winds. He checked the math and found that the student was right. He compared what velocity winds the building could withstand with weather data and found that a storm strong enough to topple Citicorp Center hits New York City every 55 years — for every year Citicorp Center was standing, there was about a 1-in-16 chance that it would collapse.

GALLERY

CREDITS

All media by Luke Cabading.

SOURCES

  • Saint Peter's Church. (2019). The Space — Saint Peter's Church. [online] Available at: https://www.saintpeters.org/the-space [Accessed 11 Jun. 2019].

  • Werner, J. and 99% Invisible (2014). The Design Flaw That Almost Wiped Out an NYC Skyscraper. [online] The Eye: Slate's Design Blog. Available at: http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_eye/2014/04/17/the_citicorp_tower_design_flaw_that_could_have_wiped_out_the_skyscraper.html [Accessed 11 Jun. 2019].

  • Nycago.org. (n.d.). St. Peter Lutheran Church - New York City. [online] Available at: http://www.nycago.org/Organs/NYC/html/StPeterLuth.html [Accessed 11 Jun. 2019].

  • Nyc-architecture.com. (n.d.). New York Architecture Images- St. Peter’s Church. [online] Available at: https://www.nyc-architecture.com/UES/UES103.htm [Accessed 11 Jun. 2019].

  • Mnys.org. (n.d.). Find A Church | MNYS. [online] Available at: https://www.mnys.org/about/find-a-church/ [Accessed 11 Jun. 2019].

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