Restoring Faith

Highly Specialized Projects for Religious Clients on Upswing

A sector that typically needs good economic times to gather funds for long-awaited renovations is in a busier cycle.

A strong economy that spurs increased donations is the answer to a prayer for religious institutions hoping to preserve cherished landmarks.

And today’s healthy economy is opening up the region’s stocked inventory of aging religious structures for new projects, says Kenneth Levien, president of Levien & Co. of New York, which offers project representative services to clients that rely upon private giving, such as religious organizations and private schools.

“When making money on Wall Street – and last year was a record year – people are more generous to churches, schools, and cultural institutions,” he says. “We’re now working on as many private schools and churches as we ever have worked on.”

But the work often comes with specialized requests and a common scenario – structures that had been neglected for years until project funds became available, says Michael Ahearn, president of Seaboard Weatherproofing and Restoration of Port Chester, N.Y.

“It’s like a home,” he says. “There are probably a million things you’d like to fix or do, but you have to wait until you have the money. There seems to be a groundswell at the moment to restore these beautiful, architectural treasures back to their original appearance.”

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Caring for Structures, Sensitivities       

Religious building restorations are similar to detailed preservation work required in secular landmark buildings in terms of technical sophistication, but they have an added ingredient: faith-community leaders seek contractors and designers who will respect the various expressions of their beliefs.

“There’s a lot of pride of ownership and emotional involvement with [religious institution] building owners,” says Thomas Corbo, vice president and general manager of the New York division of Pittsburgh-based Graciano Corp., a restoration contractor. “There are a lot of prequalifications involved to work in these buildings.”

Houses of worship also want contractors and designers who understand the needs of the liturgies and religious functions of various building features, says Tom Lindberg, an associate with Beyer Blinder Belle, a New York-based architect. For instance, the firms might be asked to recommend a different location for an altar or baptismal font.

Those kinds of decisions often require specialized experience and sensitivity to how a religion’s tenets affect the physical structure, Ahearn says.

“Philosophically, [the challenge is] figuring out what the original intent was and replicating it with the most modern means, methods, and materials to give it the same appearance,” he adds.

Another issue is that craftsmen of old typically used high-quality materials, so it takes effort to match the originals, Corbo says. Stone may have to come from a specific quarry, or a team may need to use a laboratory to match mortar.

And sometimes, the project team improves upon what is already there.

For a $1 million exterior restoration set to finish by year’s end on the Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church – an 1860 Brooklyn landmark that was a stop on the Underground Railroad to lead former slaves to liberty – Seaboard located the original stone used on the exterior.

But in the effort, which entailed restoring four brown sandstone spires and the façade, the project team determined the stone was soft and not of good quality, so it selected a different stone, imported from England and carved in Canada, that mimics the original but is more dense and will hold up better.

Such decisions to restore the structures for the long haul are particularly critical for the religious building sector because the owners usually don’t plan on revisiting construction in the short term, says Edmund Meade, a principal and director of preservation at Robert Silman Associates, a structural engineer in New York. 

“In general, faith communities are looking at a longer lifetime for their buildings, and they are looking for great impact visually and subconsciously on their congregation,” he adds.

Restore History, Rebuild from Fires     

Religious sector reconstruction efforts often start with fundamental needs, such as keeping a structure sound. For example, Levien consulted on a $25 million restoration of Saint James Episcopal Church in Manhattan in 2004 that required slowly and carefully reinforcing the foundation to prevent the church from sinking.

Similarly, a dome in the cathedral of the New Utrecht Reformed Church in Brooklyn, an 1828 landmark building, needed some basic support in an $800,000 project slated to finish this summer. Seaboard is restoring all of the wooden ribs in the dome, with workers shoring up the roof supports with steel plates to prepare for a new shingle roof, while also taking care to avoid vibrations and load shifting that could damage the original plaster ceiling. The stone and wood Gothic Revival building is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

And a series of small but critical tasks added up to a $25 million restoration project at Manhattan’s Temple Emanu-el, which was completed last year. Beyer Blinder Belle designed and Tishman Construction of New York executed the multiyear project, which entailed re-gilding, floor refinishing, new lighting and sound systems, and plaster repairs and wood replacement work for the 103-ft-high sanctuary ceiling. It also involved upgrades to electric, fire alarm, and HVAC systems.

The team worked in two phases, erecting scaffolding twice in the 2,500-seat sanctuary. It removed scaffolding in September 2005, in the middle of the project, to allow the temple to celebrate the High Holy Days.

Other recent projects stemmed from fires, including a $50 million restoration and modernization of the Central Synagogue in Midtown Manhattan in 2001, required after flames severely damaged the 1870s-era structure in 1998. Levien oversaw the project, on which Graciano cleaned the synagogue’s façade, replaced stones, patched and pointed, and added fiberglass elements that mimic older wood destroyed in the blaze.

Another fire led to a smaller project at Buffalo’s Hellenic Orthodox Church of the Annunciation, a 1907 structure. Lehigh Construction Group of Orchard Park, N.Y., completed a $1.3 million restoration in 2003 that removed and rebuilt the floor and refurbished the pews.

And in New Jersey, Silman helped to design reconstruction of two churches damaged by fire. The first was the West Side Presbyterian Church in Ridgewood, where a 2002 fire gutted the structure, leaving one stone wall and the foundation. A new steel and concrete church built last year expands past the original footprint to fit a growing congregation. 

Silman also worked on designs for a current project at Saint Bernard’s Church in Bernardsville after a 2004 fire. The Episcopal parish tapped Schtiller & Plevy of Newark to perform the restoration.

Some congregations avoid the need for major renovations through regular maintenance and repairs, but they are in the minority, Beyer Blinder’s Lindberg says. 

“There are so many buildings that are in need of care and maintenance and only a small percentage of congregations can afford to do the proper job,” he adds.

One of the few working proactively is Manhattan’s Saint Patrick’s Cathedral. It is planning an interior and exterior rehabilitation on which Silman is engineer.

Elsewhere in the region, Silman also has helped to design an ongoing restoration at Christ Church in Greenwich and the Saint James AME Church in Newark.

Some projects are taking place in phases. Last year, Seaboard completed a $1 million exterior renovation at the Eldridge Street Synagogue on the Lower East Side. It included removing all of the old mortar and replacing it with the same natural cement mix, constructing and installing seven fiberglass and steel finials, and repairing terra cotta and sandstone. The effort is part of a 20-year, $12 million renovation program for the 1887 structure.

Good Run for Hard-to-Fund Sector 

“Congregations are sensitive to current stock market validations that affect people’s sense of wealth and how much they can give to their church or synagogue,” Lindberg says.

And because most projects for religious institutions are funded individually and not as part of a regular budgeting process, endowments and fund-raising through a capital campaign fund are important parts of the restoration process, he adds.

Sometimes, congregations find grants to help fund projects, tapping consultants such as Partners for Sacred Places, a Philadelphia-based nonprofit group.

Grants from the New Jersey Historic Trust have enabled many churches in the Garden State to restore the exterior of their properties, including a project at Saint Peter the Apostle Church in New Brunswick, Silman’s Meade says. His firm is handling the project, which is using a $500,000 grant from the state to fund a roof repair, rebuild the south gable, repoint masonry, and restore wood trim on the 1870-era convent building.

But such state funds are usually limited. Meade says New Jersey will likely grant all of its available money from the current pool of funds in about a year. 

Other congregations are opting for more creative financing options. Levien says he sees faith communities leveraging their assets to fund restorations through partnerships with developers.

A prime example is the Epic, a 60-story building set to open this year that has transformed properties owned by the Franciscan Friars of Holy Name Province on West 31st Street in Manhattan.

The order, which runs the Church of St. Francis of Assisi next door, teamed with two New York developers, the Durst Organization and Sidney Fetner Associates. They created a new home for the friars and for the American Cancer Society, retail space, and a tower of 459 rental apartments – all in a 582,000-sq-ft structure funded by a $220 million loan approved by the New York State Housing Finance Agency. Gotham Construction of New York managed construction on the project designed by two New York firms, SLCE Architects and FXFowle Architects.

In another major effort, the West-Park Presbyterian Church plans to demolish a chapel on its Manhattan property and let Richman Housing Resources of New York build a 22-story high-rise residential tower, with senior and affordable housing on lower levels and market-rate condominiums above. The developer will pay to rebuild the sanctuary’s interior while preserving its exterior walls in a project that Levien says should break ground this fall.

And in Stamford, Lowe Enterprises of Los Angeles selected Kohn Pedersen Fox of New York to design Trinity Place, a 15-story office tower the developer plans to build on property leased from Saint John the Evangelist Parish of nearby Bridgeport, Conn., which will use the funds to restore its 19th Century church and rectory.

Even new projects are in the mix, such as  a 50,000-sq-ft temple in New Rochelle, N.Y., designed by Gund Partnership of Cambridge, Mass., with Horizon Project Advisors of New York as owner’s representative and Leslie Saul and Associates, also of Cambridge, as interior designer. The $15.2 million steel-framed building, which has an underground garage, will have a brick façade with stone, metal, glass, and concrete exterior elements.

Even on new projects, institutional sector construction experience is a big benefit, says Daniel Hartman, who chairs the building committee for the Young Israel of New Rochelle congregation. The panel last year hired Stamford’s Pavarini Construction, an affiliate of New York’s Pavarini McGovern, to build the new temple, which is set to open early next year.

“Pavarini’s experience with institutions was significant,” Hartman says. “For an institutional owner, it’s crucial to have a team you can trust, and that will build it to your specifications in a way that doesn’t break the bank.” 

Tom Stabile contributed to this article.