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2 Clarendon Square (Clarendon Street Baptist Church)

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Clarendon Street Baptist Church
1868, S. J. F. Thayer; 1988, Finegold Alexander + Associates.
  • 2 Clarendon Square (Clarendon Street Baptist Church) (Peter Vanderwarker or Antonina Smith)

After fire destroyed all but the exterior walls of the former Gothic Revival Clarendon Street Baptist Church in 1981, the preservation community lobbied to retain the original building footprint. The example of Graham Gund's reuse of another fire-damaged shell for the Church Court Condominiums (BB62) provided a model. James Alexander's rehabilitation proposal here inserted condominiums within the still standing perimeter red brick walls, which had to be reinforced with new bearing walls. Above the original massing, he added gabled and dormered brick and copper additions and extended or constructed new frontal towers. A key element of the revitalization of this section of the South End, the building nevertheless lacks visual coherence.

Writing Credits

Author: 
Keith N. Morgan
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Citation

Keith N. Morgan, "2 Clarendon Square (Clarendon Street Baptist Church)", [Boston, Massachusetts], SAH Archipedia, eds. Gabrielle Esperdy and Karen Kingsley, Charlottesville: UVaP, 2012—, http://sah-archipedia.org/buildings/MA-01-SE5.

Print Source

Cover: Buildings of Massachusetts

Buildings of Massachusetts: Metropolitan Boston, Keith N. Morgan, with Richard M. Candee, Naomi Miller, Roger G. Reed, and contributors. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2009, 134-134.

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