Description

The church stands in a new suburb a fair distance south of the centre of Rome, though not far from the Via Prenestina, one of the ancient Roman roads. It is bordered by a planned and approved suburb to the west and a spontaneous suburb to the east. On the slightly sloping site, about 80 by 80 metres overall, a complex of two interlocking buildings has been built. Form, size and colour have been used to clearly denote the function and hierarchy of each building. The auxiliary building has a double-hooked shape, with a long central section and two shorter elements at each end; the main building is box-shaped with a curving roof. The auxiliary building is low and is rendered a deep red colour; the main building – the church hall and bell tower – is high and clad with rough matt-shimmering panels of brownish travertine that are reminiscent of dark onyx. The ensemble of volumes is carefully composed and balanced throughout. Strong gestures greet visitors coming from either direction: with a projecting chapel on the northwest side and a cantilevered auditorium to the southeast.

One enters through the door in the centre of the west wall of the main building – a three-storey high, double-skin wall with a plane of rhythmically spaced, tall, thin, and white concrete brise-soleil elements in front of transparent glass – and enters a room of about 20 metres square. The bottom half of the walls to the left and right are clad in cherry wood and plastered pure white above. Rows of lapped timber slats rise from the rear towards the front following the curve of the ceiling, stopping as they reach the middle. The presbytery is placed in front of this arching form. From a liturgical point of view, the arrangement follows the spirit of Catholic tradition. Against the background of the brown-coloured rear wall, the green marble “podium” and green marble “paravent” give the appearance of scenery and horizon on a stage set. Directly behind the zone, a narrow stair leads to the crypt, located in the lower storey of the auxiliary building. The northern section contains the sacristy and the priest’s residence; the southern section contains seminar and work rooms, as well as an auditorium. Its entrance is signified clearly from outside, not just by the double doors and large glass pane facing the staircase, but also by a concrete cross that intersects both the entrance and the glass pane, framing two sides of each and giving them a strong white border. A covered passage passes through the red building on axis with the bell tower and connects the open recreation areas on each side of the building.

With regard to certain aspects of its design and the use of fine wood and natural stone in its interior, the Santa Maria Josefa Church is similar to some of Alvar Aalto’s churches, but without their dynamic forms.­ It is probably most comparable with Aalto’s Church of the Holy Ghost in Wolfsburg, Germany, from 1962. Both churches exhibit an arching roof where wall and roof form a single element, and not least a certain resplendence, underlined here through the luxurious use of marble.

Domus, no. 844/2002, pp. 82- | The Phaidon Atlas of Contemporary World Architecture, Comprehensive Edition, London 2004, p. 575

---

Originally published in: Rudolf Stegers, Sacred Buildings: A Design Manual, Birkhäuser, 2008.