Bethlehem Church ( da, Bethlehemskirken) is a church in the

Nørrebro Nørrebro (, ) is one of the 10 official districts of Copenhagen, Denmark. It is northwest of the city centre, beyond the location of the old Northern Gate (''Nørreport''), which, until dismantled in 1856, was near the current Nørreport station ...

district of

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...

Denmark ) , song = ( en, "King Christian stood by the lofty mast") , song_type = National and royal anthem , image_map = EU-Denmark.svg , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Danish Realm, Kingdom of Denmark ...

, located on

Åboulevard Åboulevard ( lit. "River Boulevard") is a street in central Copenhagen, Denmark. Together with H. C. Andersens Boulevard in the city centre and Borups Allé, it forms a major artery in and out of the city. The road is built over Ladegårds Å, a ...

, close to Peblinge Lake and the municipal border with

Frederiksberg Frederiksberg () is a part of the Capital Region of Denmark. It is formally an independent municipality, Frederiksberg Municipality, separate from Copenhagen Municipality, but both are a part of the City of Copenhagen. It occupies an area of ...

Peder Vilhelm Jensen-Klint Peder Vilhelm Jensen-Klint (21 June 1853 – 1 December 1930) was a Danish architect, designer, painter and architectural theorist, best known for designing Grundtvig's Church in Copenhagen, generally considered to be one of the most important ...

made the first sketches for the church but after his death it was completed by his son,

Kaare Klint Kaare Klint (15 December 1888 – 28 March 1954) was a Danish architect and furniture designer, known as the father of modern Danish furniture design. Style was epitomized by clean, pure lines, use of the best materials of his time and super ...

, and built from 1935 to 1937. Its style is remniscient of

Grundtvig's Church Grundtvig's Church ( da, Grundtvigs Kirke) is located in the Bispebjerg district of Copenhagen, Denmark. It is a rare example of expressionist church architecture. Due to its originality, it is one of the best known churches in the city. History ...

, Jensen Klint's most famous work, which was also completed posthumously by Kaare Klint, although on a much smaller scale.

History

Bethlehem Church is one of many churches in Copenhagen built by the Copenhagen Church Trust, founded in 1890 to collect money and build new churches in the rapidly growing Danish capital, and

was charged with the design. He had already designed Anna Church and the monumental

in Copenhagen as well as

Gedser Church Gedser Church lies in the town of Gedser on the southern tip of the Danish island of Falster. It is the church of Gedser Parish. Completed in 1915, it was designed by Peder Vilhelm Jensen-Klint, best known for designing Grundtvig's Church in Copen ...

on the island og

Falster Falster () is an island in south-eastern Denmark with an area of and 43,398 inhabitants as of 1 January 2010.

and St. Hans Tveje' Church in

Odense Odense ( , , ) is the third largest city in Denmark (behind Copenhagen and Aarhus) and the largest city on the island of Funen. As of 1 January 2022, the city proper had a population of 180,863 while Odense Municipality had a population of 20 ...

. Jensen-Klint also designed a congregation house close by which was completed in 1931. After Jensen-Klint's death on 1 December 1930,

, his son, completed the design process based on his father's initial sketches. The church was built from 1935 to 1937 and consecrated on 13 February 1938 by the Bishop of Copenhagen.

Architecture

The church building is integrated in the row of houses and the facade toward the street is built in red brick. Its style is strongly remniscient of Jensen Klint's other churches with elements from

Gothic Revival architecture Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic, neo-Gothic, or Gothick) is an architectural movement that began in the late 1740s in England. The movement gained momentum and expanded in the first half of the 19th century, as increasingly ...

and

Brick Expressionism The term Brick Expressionism (german: Backsteinexpressionismus) describes a specific variant of Expressionist architecture that uses bricks, tiles or clinker bricks as the main visible building material. Buildings in the style were erected mostl ...

Interior

The three nave church room is relatively short and therefore appears strikingly high. All inside walls are clad in yellow brickwork.

Furnishings

Kaare Klint designed all furnishings and fittings. All but the font are executed in light-coloured timber with a minimum of detail. The ciborium above the

altar An altar is a table or platform for the presentation of religious offerings, for sacrifices, or for other ritualistic purposes. Altars are found at shrines, temples, churches, and other places of worship. They are used particularly in paga ...

is inspired by the altar in the

Church of the Nativity The Church of the Nativity, or Basilica of the Nativity,; ar, كَنِيسَةُ ٱلْمَهْد; el, Βασιλική της Γεννήσεως; hy, Սուրբ Ծննդեան տաճար; la, Basilica Nativitatis is a basilica located in B ...

Bethlehem Bethlehem (; ar, بيت لحم ; he, בֵּית לֶחֶם '' '') is a city in the central West Bank, Palestine, about south of Jerusalem. Its population is approximately 25,000,Amara, 1999p. 18.Brynen, 2000p. 202. and it is the capital o ...

. The canopy over the

pulpit A pulpit is a raised stand for preachers in a Christian church. The origin of the word is the Latin ''pulpitum'' (platform or staging). The traditional pulpit is raised well above the surrounding floor for audibility and visibility, access ...

is decorated with a

Star of David The Star of David (). is a generally recognized symbol of both Jewish identity and Judaism. Its shape is that of a hexagram: the compound of two equilateral triangles. A derivation of the ''seal of Solomon'', which was used for decorative ...

. The church is the first church in Denmark to use individual chairs instead of benches. Designed specifically for the church, the chair later won great popularity, both for use in other churches and when it became commercially available for private homes.

References

External links