Downtown

Downtown jewel starts painstaking restoration

The stained-glass windows at Sacred Heart will be cleaned, the stonework repaired and the exterior scrubbed.

By BABITA PERSAUD, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published April 11, 2003

The brides were warned.

Don't freak out if you're standing at the altar of Sacred Heart Catholic Church and the stained-glass windows are gone.

It's all part of a renovation project.

Starting this week, the 98-year-old church undergoes its first major restoration in decades. For the next year, contractors will clean windows, remove green stains on the outside and redo the corking around the stonework so it finally matches.

The $2-million job won't be easy. Church restoration takes patience.

There's lots of don'ts.

Don't work during weddings, meaning most Saturdays are out.

Don't work during morning Mass or mid-day confessions.

Avoid working on Sundays because that's the Lord's day of rest.

And don't touch the 1927 pipe organ, which fills up the back, upper level.

That's easier said than done. To clean the 21-foot-wide rose-patterned window behind the organ, workers have to climb scaffolding on the outside and remove each piece of stained glass individually.

There are thousands of them.

With all the restrictions, the work comes with rewards. Sacred Heart is the oldest Catholic Church on Florida's west coast, said project manager Mark Allen of Mathews Construction of Tampa. Many have called it the downtown's jewel.

Built in the Romanesque-Revival style, the church at 509 N Florida Ave. was dedicated on Jan. 15, 1905. It looks much the same today: white marble and granite with a copper roof.

Although the roof was redone in 1975, the church needs general upgrades, especially to the windows, which are opaque in places.

It's a monumental task. There are about 70 windows, some of which are 6 feet wide and 20 feet tall.

And each piece is old. The Franz Mayer glass company of Munich manufactured the glass during the church's construction.

Each window tells a biblical story. There's one of Jesus blessing the children and another of Jesus saving Peter from drowning.

To clean them, each pane has to be removed, which means chipping them from the putty. The pieces are carefully labeled and sent in sections to Bovard Stained Glass Studios in Iowa, a company that specializes in church restoration. There, the panes are dipped in an acid bath that loosens cement and lead. The entire process takes about three months.

And what happens if a piece drops? "They will fix it," Allen said.

In addition to restoring the windows, crews will rub off the green water stains from the exterior marble and clean the corking and grout around the stonework.

Rowe Architects in Tampa is doing the design work.

Money for the project comes from church fundraisers and community donations. So far, the church has raised about $1-million.

The hope is that the church will someday make the National Register of Historic Places, Allen said. And when the congregation marks the church's 100th anniversary two years from now, the building will shine.

-- Babita Persaud can be reached at 226-3322 or persaud@sptimes.com.

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