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See Floor Plans BelowMESSAGE FROM MERRIMAN HOLT POWELL ARCHITECTS
We are very excited to be able to share some highlights on the following pages of the planning work we have been doing with the parish committee on repairing and renovating your beautiful church.
Your church was designed in 1950 by Mark Lemmon, a prolific and highly respected church architect here in Texas. Over the years, dedicated parishioners have done their best to care for and maintain this masterpiece. It would have been a daunting task, even for professionals, and seventy years of exposure to the weather of the Coastal Plains has been hard on the building.
Father Orrin has asked us to work with the parish committee to try and reset the clock: to address the structural issues that threaten the beauty of the building, and to create a space appropriate to serve future generations in the parish. To that end, we have established a team of specialists and craftsmen (you have already met the contractor, Paradigm, in a previous bulletin) to tackle the most daunting problem first: the significant water intrusion into the church that manifests itself as peeling paint and falling plaster.
Water is finding its way into the church through a multitude of paths, and we will tackle them one by one. The slate roof will need to be repaired where shingles are improperly secured. Eaves, parapets, and gutters will need to be re-flashed. The flat roofs will need to be replaced. The cast stone that runs atop the parapets and in bands along the brick walls will need to be flashed and caulked properly. Large areas of the brick walls will need to have their mortar repaired. Leaks at the beautiful stained glass in the sanctuary and in the choir will need to be fixed; these leaks are damaging the walls, and in danger of damaging the stained glass. This extensive focus on the exterior repair will allow us to
repair and renovate the interior without the fear of these improvements being damaged in future leaks.
On the interior, aside from repairs and repainting throughout, we will remove the current carpeted sanctuary platform and restore the area to its original marble. The altar and ambo will move towards the back wall, allowing a new communion rail on the platform and some extra pews in the main area. We will refinish and repair all the pews. Around the pews, we will remove the carpet in the aisles and replace it with a beautiful stone-look tile. Under the pews, we will use an attractive and low maintenance LVT flooring.
We will renovate the two side chapels in the transepts. The west one will be dedicated to all saints. Here, the pews there will be angled slightly to allow better views of the sanctuary and better connection to the congregation. The east one will be dedicated to Our Lady of the Rosary. It will feature a larger statue and more ornate wall decoration. This will set it apart from the church proper: it will be a unique space for devotional prayer. We are providing statue niches and small devotional spaces along the back wall and in the narthex alcoves as well. Icons of the five Luminous Mysteries will adorn the back wall below the choir rail.
The narthex, while receiving the stone-look tile floor, will feature more practical improvements. Most notably, new ADA-compliant men's and women's restrooms that will flank the entrance. A lot of work needs to be done, and the work itself will take much time. The result, however, will not only bring Holy Rosary's church back to its original beauty, but will guarantee it will serve future parishioners as well.