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Wheeler Kearns Architects - Mission Chapel of St. Joseph Congregation Sukkat Shalom Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church
When a space we design resonates with your deepest intention, it has a lasting and powerful impact. As we work with you, we devote all our energies to understanding your core purpose, the transformation you seek, your mission.
We want to see your challenge through your eyes. Doing this guides us to what we call the “emotional center,” the heart around which your entire project revolves. We return to that central idea as we craft concepts, help you make decisions, and refine our responses to those choices. Everything from the big-picture view to the design of a door handle evolves from that emotional center.
The result is a space that responds uniquely to your mission, even as you balance aspiration with budget. For a food pantry in Lakeview, this meant creating a place for clients that was infused with a sense of dignity, home and respect. When one of the pantry’s first clients exclaimed, “This place is so nice, I forgot I was poor!” we knew we’d gotten it right.
Wheeler Kearns is a collective practice of architects.
We work with people who seek to enrich their lives in spaces that embody their purpose, energy and vision.
Year Completed 2018 Location 1170 N River Rd Des Plaines, IL 60016
Chapel of St. Joseph
In response to its growing congregation and lack of shelter for the 6,000 weekly worshipers and pilgrims, the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe (SOLG) transformed a former 1937 gymnasium into the new pilgrimage Chapel of St. Joseph.
The site is located on an approximately 122-acre campus shared with Maryville Academy and owned by the Archdiocese of Chicago. The Chapel is the Shrine’s initial first step towards developing year-round worship spaces that one day may include the construction of a new Basilica.
Renovations to the existing gym, to make it fully accessible, include a new north entry addition, oriented toward the Shrine for processions and visitors.
The nave, organized like a traditional pilgrimage church with side chapels along its length, locates statues beneath a series of wire mesh canopies. Former glass block windows and masonry openings are filled with warm surfaces and clerestory windows that fill the space with daylight. The Chapel is a result of the combined effort of a devoted community making use of resources available and focused on elevating the spiritual experience for a visiting pilgrim. The Chapel is very much a pledge of its own, the fulfillment of a promise, not only to Our Lady of Guadalupe, but to its own community as well; a symbol, now precedent, for the rest of the local, regional, national, and international community, that a small group of people can make a global impact.
Year Completed 2012 Location 1001 Central Ave Wilmette, IL 60091 Awards
2013 Wilmette Historic Preservation Recognition Award
Congregation Sukkat Shalom
A Congregation, and a new home.
In 2010 Congregation Sukkat Shalom invited WKA to conduct a feasibility study to convert a midcentury Christian Science church in Wilmette into their synagogue. Combined with promotional watercolor renderings, the capital campaign was successful and resulted in the purchase of the 16,000sf masonry and expressed glulam structure, with construction beginning in Fall 2011.
Most importantly, the project reconfigured the existing organ-focused auditorium to house the Sanctuary and Bimah, visually integrating it with a new enclosed garden to the North.
Strategic interior alterations and refurbishment of the building accommodated the Congregation’s education programs and administration needs, attended to accessibility and life safety compliance throughout, and overhauled the original building HVAC system.
Original redwood was salvaged and reused; a new fir shell was formed over the Bimah, improving natural acoustics while integrating mechanical ventilation; existing materials of textured diffuse glass, limestone and brick masonry were countered with slate and darkened steel; CNC technology was utilized for new exterior metal signage, as well as the creation of decorative metalwork for coat hanging wall panels. Respecting the spirit and character of the original building, the Congregation made their new home; a shelter of peace.
Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church
Year Completed 2017 Location 1234 N Arlington Heights Rd, Arlington Heights, IL 60004
After decades of growth, capital campaigns and construction, Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church found their current home to be poorly organized and lacking an architectural center of gravity.
While each building element constructed over the years was located pragmatically, in terms of land usage, well-built of materials consistent with its neighbors and of similar architectural language, the sum of the parts was not cohesive. The congregation sought to renovate and expand their facility to build community within their congregation, attract new families, and upgrade their facilities to support their ministries and outreach mission.
The design team’s objective was not to redefine their image, but to find a simple solution to unite their campus, and their congregation, around a big idea. Rather than adding another “part”, the design cultivates their already established architectural language and embeds a new social center with connective, intuitive circulation around a formerly hidden inner courtyard.
The newly created gathering space is spanned by a 16’ x 30’ electrochromic glass roof, providing a light-filled breakout area for members and guests to enjoy fellowship. Concurrent campus improvements included developing a new palette of interior finishes, flooring, upgraded high efficiency lighting, and upgraded MEP, AV and roofing systems, all to extend the useful life of the building for the next 50 years.
