A beautiful tragedy?
A Dutch bookstore chain is settled inside this 13th century Dominican church in Maastricht, Holland. The cathedral was build in 1294, and while the floor space is only 750 square meters, the shopping space has been built vertically, transforming the space into 1,200 square meters.
Look at this beautiful place!
As beautiful as it may be, this is a sad reminder to me of the current post-Christian state of Europe.
[via My Modern Met]
Adam Shields says
It is beautiful. I would tweak your last comment though. Churches are not becoming extinct, they are changing. There is a question in many people’s mind whether a church should devote the amount of resources to keep a building like this usable. It make sense for businesses that are trying to create an emotion and sense of space as part of their business.
(That being said, I am not saying churches should not be beautiful, just that I have seen many churches struggle trying to maintain a building and forget their real purpose.)
Daniel Berman says
I empathize with the sense of violation as I have felt it myself. That said Adam your right.
I have been entrigued by Islam’s fascination with turning churches into mosques. They fail to realize that the church building is not where the power of the Christian faith comes from.
Eric Dye says
Adam, I agree that churches should not devote too many resources for buildings that are used once, twice maybe three times a week for a few hours at a time. Take the Chrystal Cathedral for example! As for a place for business, I would totally jump at the chance to have a business inside one of these old church buildings. Even the old building in the small town in Italy where I live is nothing short of amazing. Truly buildings of art. What I meant by my comment (and I have now tweaked it in the post ;-)) as these churches are turned into business, it is somewhat of a sad reminder to me of the current post-Christian state of Europe.
Jonathan Blundell says
DJ Chuang has started a great collection of ex-churches on Pinterest:
http://pinterest.com/djchuang/ex-church/
The very from the very simple to the extreme.
Eric Dye says
Wow. That’s amazing.
Chris Ames says
amazing.