“A city commission on Thursday April 4, 2024 unanimously recommended landmark designation for a 118-year-old Hyde Park church.

“Hyde Park Union Church, 5600 S. Woodlawn Ave., sailed through the Commission on Chicago Landmarks meeting to recommend the church for landmark designation, which would protect both exterior and interior elements from future demolition. The final approval now heads to the City Council.

“The preliminary designation, inked Feb. 8, covered just the church’s exterior. But in late March, the commission requested consent from the congregation to also include interior ‘historical and architectural features.’

“‘The significance of this building is clear,’ Patrick Grossi, director of development and policy at Preservation Chicago, said.

“The structure, located two blocks north of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Robie House, was built in 1906. James Gamble Rogers — best known for his Collegiate Gothic buildings at universities like Yale, Columbia and Northwestern — was the architect.

“Hyde Park Union was designed in the Richardsonian Romanesque architecture style, as seen in the building’s rounded archways, gabled roof and rusticated stone walls — giving the structure a ‘sense of majesty and permanence,’ according to a city staff report.

That same report notes ‘the entrance vestibules and sanctuary’ in the landmark designation and ‘the overall historic spatial volume and historic decorative finishes and features.’ Of note are the church’s stained glass windows, designed by artist Louis Comfort Tiffany and other prominent stained glass artists.

Susan van der Meulen, an architect and parishioner of Hyde Park Union, called the church ‘beautiful. It has excellent architectural qualities and beautiful stained glass.”

The recommendation raises public awareness about the need to preserve clerical architecture — something Grossi said is being lost, along with clerical art.

Also present at Thursday’s meeting was Preservation Chicago Executive Director Ward Miller, who voiced the nonprofit’s continuing support to landmark Bridgeport’s Ramova Theatre.

Miller also applauded Mayor Brandon Johnson and Department of Planning and Development Commissioner Ciere Boatright on Wednesday’s La Salle Street announcement.

“These are great strides forward,” he said. (Miller, Chicago Sun-Times, 4/4/24)

Read the full story at Chicago Sun-Times

• City panel recommends landmark status for century-old Hyde Park church; A landmark designation for the Hyde Park Union Church, designed by architect James Gamble Rogers, would protect exterior and interior elements from future demolition, Abby Miller, Chicago Sun-Times, 4/4/24
• Hyde Park Union Church Receives Preliminary Landmark Designation, Hannah Faris, Hyde Park Herald, 2/26/28
• Hyde Park Union Church Open House Chicago