Architects solve problems, and inspired designs that solve those problems is how they demonstrate the profession’s value. But the challenge of creating a place where we connect beyond what architecture may solve is unique. Libraries, courthouses, hospitals, museums, schools—these are all intricate puzzles of functionality. In creating places of spiritual expression, sacred spaces, design must go beyond mere problem solving.

Traditional places of religion—churches, synagogues, temples, mosques—are undergoing an existential change. Like shopping malls and movie multiplexes, places of worship are in the throes of a deep cultural reset. These abandoned buildings reflect where we are as a society, and new designs can offer insight about where our values lead. 

Worship spaces have a seminal difference from all other building types: Beyond solving the problems of every assembly space, sacred spaces need to respond to the cultural evolution that has led to so many of them being desanctified and changing use. The history of designing assembly spaces with an added layer of decoration that facilitates ritual and spiritual renewal is becoming irrelevant to those who crave individual connection to something greater than themselves. 

My experience as an architect is that humans are inexplicably moved by the beauty we each discover, not the design that architects impose. In the 21st century, people are finding more spiritual connection to the natural world and through relationships to other people, and less in tradition, ritual, and iconography. Those trappings are the stuff of organized religion, the traditional client of sacred architecture. But spirituality exists in everyone, in any context, often without religion or a defined deity. 

There is a model for understanding the way spiritual buildings are evolving: it’s also found in people who think of their homes as a direct extension of who they are, rejecting traditional real estate marketing, which treats home purchasing like buying a car. I have spent 40 years dealing with these kinds of clients, people who see themselves reflected in the place where they live. Traditional religions have been similarly marketed as real estate has: fixed products that can be bought into. But that system is not working for those who are searching for spiritual connection, and that parallels how my clients view their homes. For homes and worship spaces, it’s not enough to be safe, functional, and attractive. There’s a reason we call a church a “House of God.”

I don’t have value for those who want a “traditional” home that knits together the icons of domestic style: a “modern” open plan, with the traditional shape and trim so common in spec homes. This is true of those hiring me to help create sacred places as well. Instead, I listen to all my clients and draw out their loves and hopes, using those as the central basis for a design. I have found that both homes and houses of worship have intimate meaning as their primary value.

Designing open intimacy is nothing new. Traditional sacred spaces have existed for centuries. History has a tangible value in our lives, deep spiritual meaning. But architects cannot consciously create history, regardless of what elements we employ. And in a changing culture, what we have done in history has less meaning than what we can design to address change. So, how do you create that which you do not fully understand? You can’t. You discover it. If you problem-solve auditoriums of religious ritual, you’ll live in a cultural dead end. 

How do you transcend the dance of ceremony and icons that is traditional religious theater? Designers need to be reminded that they’re not leaders, they’re followers—not of ritual and tradition, but of what people value. We then use our understanding and expertise to design something that expresses those values.

In sacred space, we’re not rooting for a team, listening to a lecture or a concert, learning a theology, engaging in self-help, or having a party. We don’t worship altars or icons. Faith is communal, about touching something that inexplicably moves us.

This is easy enough to say, but how do designers listen to, communicate, and then connect the humanity of faith in the buildings we design? There are some clearly delineated processes that can open up how we feel to what we want to build:

1. Get to know the people of the faith who will use the place you are helping to create. Listen to the practical needs, but also for what has meaning. The priest, rabbi, pastor, or imam are important, but they come and go over time. The congregation has a common focus that transcends the specifics of a current moment.
2. Use models, drawings, sketches, and meetings to actively suggest, react to, and evolve thoughts based on options, opportunities, and the revelation of challenges. Never, ever “sell,” and never direct. Listen and trust; your faith is a direct reflection of belief in the reality that a greater truth than you can define is leading an open process.
3. Money is always a central part of every design direction. This is not a commercial enterprise, there is no quid pro quo: powerful connections to the hopes and faith can generate funding, but a great design is not self-funding, and money is simply another vehicle of faith.
4. In all the discernment and evolution, the designer has to see critical long-term values that are often overlooked in creating for the moment. Accepting change can be designed into a building’s design. There are also two more prosaic criteria architects must bring to every design. The first is flexibility. While a central focus is often crucial (altars, lecterns, bima, and pulpits are needed), these realities always change, and a great space can accept changes. The second is storage. As things inevitably change, needs change, and the things used to address those needs change. If this reality is not addressed, bypassed/unused “stuff” is present, left where it is easiest to put it, often breaking the beauty of a place.
5. For almost all sacred space creation, there is an “inside first” design imperative. Typically, there is one focal place, and the support spaces should be in full service of it, and determined by it. Similarly, the exterior is about greeting and acceptance, and that could mean a compelling exterior, but if the interior space is not the primary reward of those coming to the place, the building is compromised.

All of these perspectives are the designer’s contribution, but all of them are based on listening to those who gather to worship. All the materials, lighting, furniture, sound and movement any design can employ are the same tools. In designing to capture and embrace faith, the way we define a building goes beyond the necessary and is fundamentally about the people and the shared experience. Houses of worship do not contain an audience, but a dance of love and hope in social connection. 

Because any place we build has to satisfy all the practical realities of construction, a place of worship could just be a warehouse with the humans creating the sacred environment. And many are just that and remain deeply meaningful for the worshipers involved. But those spaces do not value or even need a designer. Sacred space design is like sculpting with water, without a rulebook, spec sheet or special code requirements. The difference in design approach and process has to be open to discovering what the faith of the users embodies, rather than a checklist of design imperatives. 

In every way we can, designers of sacred places must respond to our humanity, must listen to things that are not architectural but have architectural accommodations. We’re not the rabbis of sacred design, we listen to the faith that passes all understanding.

Feature image: The Chaoel at Incarnation Camp designed and photographed by the author.