Shadyside Presbyterian Church

About this property

The Shadyside Presbyterian Church is a large congregation of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) in an historic section of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. Located at the corner of Amberson Avenue and Westminster Place in the Shadyside neighborhood of the city of Pittsburgh, the Shadyside Presbyterian Church was founded in 1866 as a congregation in the Presbyterian denomination. It has enjoyed a long history of local, national, and global recognition for its outreach, missions, and music. Distinctively formal, traditional, and liturgical, worship services are described as "Reformed and Reverential" with nods to the congregation's ancestral heritage in the Church of Scotland. The principal worship service is held at eleven o'clock on Sunday mornings. The Shadyside Church building, the congregation's third, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a prime example of Richardsonian Romanesque architecture. It was completed in 1890 to designs of American architectural firm Shepley, Rutan & Coolidge, the successor firm to H.H. Richardson's office. The resulting design heavily echoes that of Richardson's Trinity Church in Boston. The interior of the church underwent several alterations during its first forty-eight years; what is largely seen in the worship space today dates from a major renovation undertaken in 1938. Elements of note include windows by the Gorham Company of New York, Tiffany & Company of New York, and Rudy Brothers of Pittsburgh; intricately carved stone and woodwork throughout, and a prominent Byzantine mosaic by Rudolf Scheffler which fills the chancel apse. The church is built in the Protestant "auditorium-style" popular in the late nineteenth century, a result of stout transepts and a large, central lantern tower which form a Greek cross in plan. The building's dominating pyramidal roof, adorned with four dormers (architecturally referred to as "witches hat"), features prominently in the neighborhood skyline. Built on land gifted by Thomas Aiken, the first Shadyside church was built to Aiken's designs. Work began in 1866 and was completed in 1867. By the early 1870s, the first building proved too small and plans were made for a second, larger building on the same site. Despite an economic depression in 1873, a second church was built to the plans of James H. Windrom of Philadelphia. Ground was broken in 1874 and the new building dedicated in 1875 with the first church building being retained for use as a chapel. With seating for 700 to 800, the second church was "English Decorated Gothic" in style and included a tower with spire which rose 140 feet into the sky.

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Property data from the National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service (public domain).

Description adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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