Local architecture and landscape studios Jones Studio and Chris Winters Associates have converted an Italian Gothic revival-style church into an event venue in Downtown Phoenix.
Originally built in 1929 by Arizona architecture firm Fitzhugh & Byron, the structure underwent a fire in 1984. It was abandoned and declared a hazard by the city until a local non-profit purchased it and began its revival into today's Monroe Street Abbey event space.
Local studios Jones Studio and Chris Winters Associates have converted a Phoenix church into an event space
Led by landscape architect Chris Winters Associates and architects Jones Studio, the adaptive reuse project included preserving and stabilizing the building's original architecture and adding new elements, including second and third-floor balconies that look out over a central courtyard. The structure consists of a four-storey main building and a seven-storey bell tower, which sits at the church's front corner. A two-storey, stucco addition was added to the building's west side in the late 1940s, and continued the Gothic revival style language of the building's facade.
The project included preservation of existing architecture and the addition of new elements
It is organized around a central courtyard, with a semi-enclosed passageway and upper-floor hallways that run along its perimeter and connect to various rooms throughout the building's four storeys.
The courtyard was once an enclosed auditorium, but due to the 1980s fire...