Old Cambridge Baptist Church
- Architect
- Alexander Rice Esty
- Year
- 1867
- Style
- Gothic Revival
- City
- Boston, MA
Old Cambridge Baptist Church's congregation split off from Cambridge's First Baptist Church in 1844, and in 1869 built the current Gothic Revival meeting house on Harvard Street, designed by architect Alexander Rice Esty. Built of local fieldstone and granite quarried in Somerville, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1982.
the building
Stone and stained glass. Esty built the church of heavy gray fieldstone and Somerville granite in an asymmetrical massing meant to display structural strength, a solidity thrown into relief by the large, delicate stained glass windows the stone walls both reveal and protect.
1897 fire and rebuild. The original parish hall burned down in 1897; its rebuilding was directed by Clarence Blackall, a noted Boston theater architect.
the style
The church is considered a notable example of the muscular use of stone typical of American Gothic Revival architecture, its heavy fieldstone walls and asymmetrical massing meant to convey structural strength.
More on Gothic Revivalsignificance
Old Cambridge Baptist Church was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1982.
nearby
- Harvard Union
- Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts
- Harvard Lampoon Building
- Fogg Museum
- Harvard Art Museums
- Sever Hall