‘Third Place’

By Jennifer Taylor

Ancient Athens created the agora, an open-air marketplace and gathering spot where the city”s residents could catch up on the latest news. Medieval Europeans built their towns around huge cathedrals. Today, our “third place”””the place we experience community in addition to home and work””is often a Starbucks, bookstore, or golf course.

After 10 years working as an “imagineer” at Disney, Mel McGowan dreamed of the church being this third place. Today, McGowan serves as president of Visioneering Studios (a partner ministry with Church Development Fund, Stadia: New Church Strategies, and corporate parent Provision Ministry Group) and leads a team committed to using architecture as an evangelistic tool.

Visioneering Studios (www.visioneeringstudios.com) believes everyday church design is ineffective””for leaders, for the churches they serve, and for the communities they hope to reach. Instead, the team at Visioneering suggests a new approach for conceptualizing and constructing these facilities.

Visioneering”s project managers, designers, and architects understand the pull of the destination; in their previous careers they helped create resorts in Las Vegas, luxury hotels in Asia, and the Disney-MGM park in Paris.

“People travel from around the world to visit these places, and spend hundreds of dollars to experience them,” says McGowan. “We believe the techniques used to build those places can be applied to ministry facilities, as well. We”re not interested in gimmicks, but in architectural evangelism: creating church buildings that inspire and educate people, and that become tools to communicate the gospel.”

Preventing Problems
Architectural evangelism means more than attractive buildings. In fact, facilities communicating the good news are the finished product of a larger process. This process, which includes interactive sessions with church leadership, strategic analysis, and detailed budget development, can prevent common problems that plague church building projects.

For many churches, these problems begin when the ministry staff must serve as site planners and real estate developers as well as spiritual leaders.

“Statistics show that often the senior minister or another key member of leadership will leave the church by the end of a building project,” says McGowan. “I want to see the preaching minister or executive pastor leading out of his giftedness, not trying to be a general contractor.”

Visioneering asks church leaders to share the dreams and goals for their campus, then transforms those ideas into recommended site plans and designs. This work is just one part of a larger, multidisciplinary package of services that can take the church from dream to bricks-and-mortar reality.

Visioneering”s services not only allow church leaders to lead, but also assist building committees focusing attention””and dollars””on the wrong things. “In the last 10 years, churches increased spending on facilities by 10 percent,” says McGowan. “And in those same 10 years, church attendance decreased by 10 percent. Churches are throwing more money at less effective buildings.”

Creating Paradigms
So while the principle “form follows function” still rings true””a ministry facility should be designed to facilitate ministry””Visioneering Studios encourages its clients to consider other paradigms as well.

“¢ Form follows “fiction”“””The environment of a church helps tell the story,” McGowan says. “We work with each church to develop a foundational “˜big idea” which becomes the conceptual overlay for the entire campus plan.”

The Visioneering team discovers, rather than dictates, each church”s big idea.

“The team met with our ministers and elders and listened to our goals of being open to the community,” says Jim Hanchey, executive minister at Heritage Christian Church, Fayetteville, Georgia. “And they reflected it back to us literally overnight. When we met the second day, they shared really insightful observations””things we hadn”t even realized about ourselves. We now have master plans that reflect our vision.”

Because each church has its own culture and goals, the big ideas unifying each plan differ from project to project.

In Beloit, Wisconsin, the Visioneering team explored the town in addition to meeting with the key leadership staff at Central Christian Church. “Lots of industry and factories have closed in Beloit,” says Craig Zastrow, executive pastor at Central. “They looked at this depressed area and brought back the theme “˜Restore.” That theme””rebuilding the walls of our community””runs throughout our new campus plan, including a “˜Nehemiah Prayer Walk.””

Other campuses tell different stories. Crossroads Christian Church in Corona, California, incorporates circles of light throughout its property (Corona means “crown” in Spanish). Visioneering designed Highland Meadows Christian Church near Grapevine, Texas, with a central hallway””appropriately named Vine Street””leading through rooms full of trellises, arbors, and Texas craftsman-style touches. Kids worship at the “Hollywood & Vine Studios.”

One of the first campuses Visioneering designed from scratch was The Crossing in Las Vegas. “We proposed a “˜journey through the desert” theme to reflect the idea of believers journeying together to the promised land,” says McGowan. “The central area became the Court of Pillars. The Israelites followed God as he led them with a pillar of cloud and a pillar of fire; visitors to The Crossing see water misters during the day and brightly lit torches after dark.”

In addition to these large design elements, Visioneering uses graphics and building materials to further develop the theme. “The Crossing”s buildings feature stucco, fabrics, and metal,” McGowan says. “The campus is well done, and built to last, but these materials traditionally reflect an architecture of impermanence””perfect for a church on a journey.”

“¢ Form follows finance””These materials also cost less than many others””which makes them even more appealing. Realizing that every church is on a budget, Visioneering embraces cost-effective solutions throughout the design process.

As a result, the designers and architects at Visioneering resist “warehouse churches” from both a financial and creative perspective.

“People think the cheapest way to build a church is the “˜gymtorium” with classrooms built around the sides,” McGowan says. “But even a plain hallway costs $100 per square foot. In sunbelt climates we can direct foot traffic outdoors, where brick pavement and shade cost a fifth or tenth of that.”

The strategy isn”t limited to warm areas of the country. In Manchester, New Hampshire, Visioneering multiplied the attractiveness of the property by using the existing topography and landscaping to create garden walls and other inexpensive features. They redirected the saved money into graphics and flooring, creating a New England lodge feel inside.

“We used the same amount of money the church would put into a “˜vanilla” building, but we directed the dollars into things that will attract people,” says McGowan.

“¢ Form follows feet””He”s quick to add that a church”s master plan must also be pragmatic and user-friendly. “Churches shouldn”t be surrounded by oceans of hard-to-access parking,” he says. “There should be shade, with separate paths for pedestrians and vehicles.

“You can have a great design, but you also have to ask yourself how a single mom with two small children will get from her car to their classrooms.”

Routine Has Left the Building
While Visioneering often works with megachurches, McGowan commits a portion of money and time to assist smaller churches with big dreams. And although it specializes in working with churches from the beginning, Visioneering”s staff also enjoys the challenge of adding value to unusual in-process designs.

A team at West Ridge Community Church, Elgin, Illinois, designed an unorthodox master plan for their property including luxury townhomes, commercial development, a café, and a House of Blues-style worship venue. When the West Ridge team experienced problems with the master plan, Visioneering provided design consulting.

“The plan included a 100-foot-high water wall adjacent to the café, and we didn”t have a clue how to make it work,” says Darren Sloniger, copastor at West Ridge and a real estate developer. “Visioneering helped us solve the problem, and also flew here from California when we had 24 hours to solve a major soil problem on part of the land.”

Whatever the project, the Visioneering team believes strategic design can be “bait” in the fishing of men. “We call it “˜destination architecture” because we create place-based experiences,” says McGowan. “But it also refers to the impact we hope each place will have””to influence people”s destination.”

Jennifer Taylor, a contributing editor to CHRISTIAN STANDARD, is director of project integration with Church Development Fund, Irvine, California.