Douglas Ellington won the design competition for First Baptist Church, while he was living in Pittsburgh. Robert J. Bateman, pastor of the church, had a strong interest in evangelism, and Ellington designed a striking facility with an entryway that stood as an open invitation to the community. The design for the church went through several changes. The dome in particular evolved from the first design that Ellington sketched on the back of a photograph of a movie theater he had done in Maute, Pennsylvania. A more finished drawing shows a dome with eight flat sides, compared to the final more spherical dome divided into 8 segments.
Many aspects of First Baptist Church reflect the Beaux-Arts style in which Ellington was trained. In designing the building he uses elements of Arts and Crafts, Art Nouveau and the Romantic Style styles as well as an Italian Renaissance form. The building’s design features characteristic Beaux-Arts features including its symmetrical arrangement, monumental, central mass and its classical references.
The most striking aspect of the building is its imposing, multicolored dome. While domes are not uncommon in church architecture, they are more rare in Protestant churches. Brunelleschi’s dome for the Florence cathedral has been suggested as the inspiration for Ellington’s dome on the First Baptist Church; both domes are convex, octagonal forms covered with tile. Ellington’s dome was constructed using a self-supporting framework of steel beams. He designed the tiles on the dome to blend, from green at the top down to the red lower sections of the dome. The effect is to simulate the patina that would form as the copper lantern set atop the dome aged. Thus, the new Church had the appearance it would take on as it aged.
In addition to Brunelleschi’s dome another, potential source of inspiration is Rafael Guastavino’s dome of St. Lawrence Basilica located less than a mile due west of the site of the First Baptist Church. St. Lawrence’s dome is listed as the largest self-supporting, elliptical dome in America. Given Ellington’s interest in harmonizing his structures with their environment, it seems unlikely that he would not have considered the design of St. Lawrence while working on his plan for the Church.
Through Ellington’s emphasis on organic forms, vibrant colors and exotic themes, Art Nouveau is clearly recognizable. The band of terra cotta that line the outer wall of the church, the heather-purple tones that dominate the brickwork and the integration of floral motifs tie into the Art Nouveau influence. Romantic Style elements are found in the Church as well, particularly in the stylized feathers as rows of chevron that serve as an ongoing motif in the building and the furniture he designed for the sanctuary. The octagonal shape of the dome and the frequent use of tripartite divisions also show ties to the Romantic Style and to his later design for the Asheville City Building.
First Baptist’s original orientation to the City was lost when I-240 was built nearby. Ellington had designed the Church to fit in a wide Y shape formed by one street curving around the buildings and a second street that terminated just below the steps leading into the sanctuary.
