The First Unitarian Church in

Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Anglo-Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland, Cali ...

is a former church building that was built in 1898. It was designed by Albert C. Schweinfurth, who made unconventional use of

Shingle Style architecture The shingle style is an American architectural style made popular by the rise of the New England school of architecture, which eschewed the highly ornamented patterns of the Eastlake style in Queen Anne style architecture in the United States, Que ...

, usually applied to homes, in designing a church. It was also highly unusual for a church building in several other ways, including the use of industrial-style metal sash windows, sections of redwood tree trunks as pillars, the strong horizontal emphasis, and a semicircular apse with a conical roof."Berkeley Landmarks: First Unitarian Church". Berkeleyheritage.com. 2008-05-15. Retrieved 2013-06-19. The building is listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

, the California State Historic Resources Survey, and is a City of Berkeley Landmark.Harvey Helfand, ''University of California, Berkeley'' (Princeton Architectural Press, 2002), pp. 177–180. It has also been known as University Dance Studio and Bancroft Dance Studio for its current use. Although originally outside the university grounds, it is now the second oldest building still standing on the Berkeley campus. At the time it was built, facing a block of Dana Street that no longer exists, it joined a cluster of Protestant churches that had been built since the 1870s with the encouragement of the university administration. The land was acquired by the university in 1960 through

eminent domain Eminent domain, also known as land acquisition, compulsory purchase, resumption, resumption/compulsory acquisition, or expropriation, is the compulsory acquisition of private property for public use. It does not include the power to take and t ...

for the construction of a student union complex. The church was the first meeting place of the Hillside Club, formed in 1898 to promote

Arts and Crafts movement The Arts and Crafts movement was an international trend in the decorative and fine arts that developed earliest and most fully in the British Isles and subsequently spread across the British Empire and to the rest of Europe and America. Initiat ...

principles in the growing university town. When it was built,

A. C. Schweinfurth A. C. Schweinfurth (1864–1900), born Albert Cicero Schweinfurth, was an American architect. He is associated with the First Bay Tradition, an architectural style from the period of the 1880s to early 1920s. Early life Schweinfurth was the son ...

, the architect, was well on his way to an eminent career with the patronage of the Hearst family, but this church ended up being his last project. While it was under construction, he began a two-year European tour with his wife and daughter. He came down with typhoid fever and died in September 1900. In 1908 the congregation built an adjacent building called Unity Hall, designed by member

Bernard Maybeck Bernard Ralph Maybeck (February 7, 1862 – October 3, 1957) was an American architect. He worked primarily in the San Francisco Bay Area, designing public buildings, including the Palace of Fine Arts in San Francisco, and also private houses, ...

, which was demolished in 1965 for the construction of Zellerbach Hall. The Schweinfurth-designed building was preserved, landmarked, and restored with seismic upgrades and new shingles in 1999.

References

External links

Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley website
{{National Register of Historic Places in California Churches on the National Register of Historic Places in California Shingle Style architecture in California Churches completed in 1898 Buildings and structures in Berkeley, California National Register of Historic Places in Berkeley, California 1898 establishments in California Unitarian Universalist churches in California Berkeley landmarks in Berkeley, California

See also

References

External links