Project Description
It has been said that, “Prayer is bringing our helplessness to God.” For thousands of years spaces and places have been specifically designed to foster ones intimate communication with God. Redemption Church in Gilbert, Arizona challenged debartolo architects to design such a place in one of their existing buildings designed ten years earlier by the same architect. In response to this need, debartolo employed seven strategies in making a recently completed Prayer Space. 1. Tactility, where one’s senses are awakened to a unique experience through close contact with one material making the floor, walls and ceiling. 2. Ordinariness, a space completely crafted from common douglas fir members where an ordinary material is made into something extraordinary through its craft and arrangement. 3. Humility, where the hand-made quality of the space speaks to the rich history of craft and making. 4. Stillness, visual and acoustical stillness creates a space of secure holiness, set apart from the exterior and the noise. 5. Threshold, a steel ramp rises gently into the new space, serving as a threshold to the experience, slowing one down and raising one’s awareness. 6. Rest, fixed benches crafted from the same douglas fir – rise out of the floor to create flexible furniture that accommodates individuals, small groups or larger gatherings. 7. Gaps, slender gaps in the ceiling integrate acoustics, lighting, return air and sprinklers. Gaps between the wood members of the walls emit light, allow the space expand and hold folded prayers that become evidence of people’s faith. Constructed completely from Douglas Fir, the recently completed Prayer Space is transformative and set apart from the rest of the campus to create a sacred space for prayer.