Amended Plans Presented for Re-Development of South End Church

A new set of plans for the potential re-development of the South End’s earned encouraging comments from several members of the South End Landmark District Commission who said they ultimately support the proposed adaptive reuse of the historic building.

“I would like to see this project go ahead, I’ll be clear about that,” said Commissioner John Freeman following Tuesday’s presentation. “It’s unlikely that another church is going to come along and purchase this property and use it for its intended purpose.”

Brookline resident Michael Minkoff has signed a letter of intent to purchase the Tremont Street church with plans to convert it into eight residential condominiums. The massive puddingstone building is currently home to the New Hope Baptist Congregation, which is seeking to relocate due to parking shortages and maintenance costs.

On Tuesday, architect Gary Hendren presented modified plans for the re-development of the church, which sought to address the commission’s previous concerns regarding the removal of the building's iconic arched windows. Under the new plans, the windows facing Tremont Street would be converted to a rectangular shape to satisfy health code requirements, but one arched window would be moved to the church tower.

“The idea here would be to have a remembrance or an actual duplication on the side of the building so it would be saving one of the arches,” Hendren said.

Another arch would be preserved for use as a historic marker “telling the story of the church,” Hendren said. The marker would be posted in a small garden at one corner of the site, accessible to the public.

Other changes included preserving the wooden doors facing Tremont Street and keeping the steps leading to the West Concord Street entrance.

The remainder of the plans remained almost identical to those presented in early March. The team hopes to create seven 2-story townhouse units within the main sanctuary and parish hall portions of the church and one larger unit along the West Concord Street side that would become the Minkoffs’ new home.

Several residents spoke in support of the project on Tuesday, including West Concord Street resident David Berarducci who said most of the neighbors he’s talked to support the renovation.

“They all understood the issue regarding code and they all were in favor of the windows being altered if it had to be,” he said.

West Concord Street resident and registered architect Herb Zeller expressed a different opinion, submitting diagrams demonstrating an alternate design for the renovations that he said would allow for the preservation of the church’s signature arched windows.

“With some design creativity those windows can be used,” he said. “I think if the developer/architect would step back and give this a harder look, I think he would see greater design opportunities.”

Zeller proposed three or four-floor units, with dormers lining the Tremont Street roof, a scenario Hendren said his team considered but abandoned for multiple reasons.

“We have weighed the options back and forth,” he said. “Three-level units are new and exciting…but you end up with some very odd spaces inside the units.”

Before supporting the project, which has not been formally submitted, commissioners said they needed to see visual representations of alternate designs to decide which concessions, if any, could be made.

“Nobody thinks this can be turned into condominiums without significant changes to the building,” Freeman said. “Part of where this direction’s going to go with us is what changes are acceptable and what changes are not acceptable.”

South End Historical Society Treasurer Susan Park found some of the proposed changes worrisome.

“It’s got to be done right, there should not be an inexpensive solution,” she said. “Changing the windows, changing the shapes is a significant alteration to the reading of the building.”

“Nobody really opposes condominium use,” she added. “We’re really talking about maintaining the architectural integrity of this building.”