GAD Editorial · Published ·
Deep in the Ozark woods outside Eureka Springs, Arkansas, there is a chapel made almost entirely of glass and pine. Thorncrown Chapel, designed by E. Fay Jones and built in 1980, is 48 feet tall, seats about a hundred people, and contains 425 windows covering over 6,000 square feet of glass. It is less a building than a frame for the forest.
Jones, a native Arkansan who had worked under Frank Lloyd Wright, understood the assignment from Jim Reed, the retired schoolteacher who commissioned it: a non-denominational pilgrimage chapel, a place apart for meditation. The structure is a marvel of economy — a repeating rhythm of slender pine columns and trusses. The chapel’s official account lists mainly pressure-treated 2x4, 2x6 and 2x12 lumber, sized so two people could carry the structural pieces through the woods. Larger assemblies, including the trusses, were put together on the floor and raised into position. The aim was to preserve the wooded setting, rather than clear it for large prefabricated elements.
The effect is the opposite of a cathedral's. Instead of shutting the world out to create the sacred, Thorncrown lets the world in: light filters through the canopy, leaves press against the glass, and the boundary between the congregation and the woods dissolves. It is architecture as an act of attention.
The profession noticed. The chapel was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2000 and received the AIA's Twenty-five Year Award in 2006 — rare honours for a building with no client beyond a single man's vision and a palette dominated by wood, glass and the changing forest light.
Key facts
- Completed: 1980
- Location: Eureka Springs, Arkansas, USA
- Architect: E. Fay Jones
- Construction: 425 windows / over 6,000 sq ft of glass; primarily pressure-treated pine 2x4, 2x6 and 2x12 members, with larger trusses assembled on site
- Recognition: National Register of Historic Places, 2000; AIA Twenty-five Year Award, 2006