page_title: First Unitarian Church of Rochester (building)
section_title: Interior
hierarchical_section_title: First Unitarian Church of Rochester (building) / Interior
caption_attribution_description: English: First Unitarian Church of Rochester, NY - 1st Floor Plan. Form and dimension taken from pdfs of original working drawings. Some details are modified for graphic purposes. The north side of the building is at the bottom of the drawing. The Street is to the right of the drawing. The building was built in 3 phases. The sanctuary, classrooms and lobby were completed first in 1962, the Williams Gallery and offices addition was completed in 1969 and years later an elevator addition was built
context_page_description: The First Unitarian Church of Rochester is a building that was designed by Louis Kahn and completed in 1962. It is located at 220 Winton Road South in Rochester, New York, U.S. The congregation it houses is a member of the Unitarian Universalist Association.
  The building was described in 1982 as one of "the most significant works of religious architecture of this century" by Paul Goldberger, a Pulitzer-Prize-winning architectural critic. Its exterior is characterized by deeply folded brick walls created by a series of thin, two-story light hoods that shield windows from direct sunlight. The sanctuary's complex ceiling has light towers in each corner to bring in indirect natural light.
  The story of the design process that Kahn followed at First Unitarian has been described as "almost classic in architectural history and theory". Kahn began by creating what he called a Form drawing to represent the essence of what he intended to build. He drew a square to represent the sanctuary, and around the square he drew concentric circles to indicate an ambulatory, a corridor, and the church school.
context_section_description: Instead of a grand entrance at the front of the building leading straight into the sanctuary, entry into First Unitarian is by way of a doorway at the side of the building that requires a right turn past other spaces to reach the sanctuary. The sanctuary is entered beneath the low ceiling of the cantilevered choir loft, creating a sequence from shadow into light.
  "Civilization is measured by the shape of your ceiling," said Kahn. The complex ceiling of the sanctuary rises above both floors of surrounding rooms and extends over the sanctuary wall to the outer walls of the corridor outside. Light towers in the four corners of the sanctuary bring in indirect natural light from areas that are not typically well lit. The ceiling's layered outer edges and light-filled corners give the room "an expansive, boundless character", according to Kahn biographer Robert McCarter. Kahn said, "If you think about it, you realize that you don't say the same thing in a small room as you do in a large room."
  Between the light towers is a cruciform concrete roof structure with a shape something like the underside of a ship's hull. Its outer edges do not sit directly on the sanctuary walls but rise above them, relieving what could be a perception of oppressive weightiness, according to Carter Wiseman, one of Kahn's biographers.
  The massive ceiling structure is partly supported by twelve slender columns embedded in the sanctuary walls, three columns per wall. Square brackets on top of the central column in each wall support the lower folds of the slab. The brackets are split in the middle to allow the fold to be perceived as passing through to the outer corridor walls, which provide much of the ceiling support. Each central column is braced to the columns on either side by horizontal beams. The ceiling is lowest and darkest in the center, the opposite of classic church domes that are highest and brightest in the center. The cruciform shape that Kahn used for the ceiling is one that he had used in previous works, notably the Jewish Community Center of Trenton, New Jersey.
  The tapestries on the sanctuary walls were designed by Kahn and, like the building itself, contain no literal symbolism. They were woven by Jack Lenor Larsen. At Kahn's request, the panels span the full color spectrum and yet were constructed entirely from one red, one blue, and one yellow yarn, with the remaining shades created with blends of those three yarns. The panels were designed not only for visual effect but also to correct a problem of sound reverberating from the concrete walls.
  The primary building materials of the interior are concrete block, poured concrete and wood. Kahn left the natural surfaces of these materials exposed rather than applying an additional finish. This was Kahn's first extensive use of concrete and wood together, a combination he used in most of his later projects.
  The sanctuary walls are 2 feet (0.61 m) thick and are built of concrete blocks. Hollow spaces within the walls function as ventilation ducts. The roof support columns embedded in the sanctuary walls are made of poured concrete, as is the roof and the outer walls of the corridor around the sanctuary. Left visible are patterns made by the thin strips of wood that composed the forms into which the concrete was poured. Kahn procured unusually long strips of wood to construct the forms for the sanctuary ceiling. As he had done earlier with the main stairwell in the Yale University Art Gallery, Kahn also left visible the pattern of circular holes created by the devices that held the forms together while concrete was being poured for the walls, letting the marks of construction serve as the "basis for ornament".
  Sherri Geldin, writing of Kahn in the prologue to Louis I. Kahn: In the Realm of Architecture, said: "He attached almost mythic significance to the 'meeting place,' to any setting where communal interaction occurs ... His religious buildings and projects ... aspire to evoke a state of grace that is without dogma or sectarian distinctions, underscoring instead that which is universal 
caption: First floor plan. The 1969 addition begins at the left edge of the lobby. The north side of the building is at the bottom. The street is to the right.
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