Jeremy Goucher The Cube as an Anchor for Rural Communities
Rural communities of Louisiana often revolve around Parish churches as the center structure and the backbone of the community. The St. Amant community near Baton Rouge, Louisiana is no different. Outgrowing their 1905 building that held merely 300 people, the St. Amant community was in dire need of a more contemporary and symbolic structure that would reflect their beliefs and the time. Commissioned by the community, Trahan Architects was asked to design such a building. What he provided them was a pure, simple, and functional take on an ancient courtyard typology. The cloister, often associated with the monastic lifestyle, would prove to be a perfect fit for the Roman Catholic community. The community was provided a model of devoted structure and a sense of unity with Trahan’s design. The Holy Rosary Catholic Church complex was designed based on a series of tasks and programmatic needs. With the existing buildings lacking any sense of unity and permanence a plan was needed. Drawing from the courtyard typology, Trahan arranged the programmatic necessities. This basic design type allowed the secular to be separated from the sacred. Spatial bars of administration offices and classrooms enclose the courtyard space providing privacy and serenity to the members of the congregation. With Trahan being a practicing catholic, he devoted special attention and care to this project spending a year discussing both function and poetics, including “what the chapel would feel like, how the buildings would function, and what their relationships would be.� (Ivy 248) This cooperation was critical in creating an anchor that the small community would treasure. As a growing community of 2300 families they needed a more suitable space to congregate. (Ivy 246) They needed more than a casual jumble of buildings to reflect where