Basilica of St. Augustine: Splendor on Display in Florida

In this installment of ‘Larger Than Life: Architecture Through the Ages,’ we visit a grand historic church in America’s oldest town.

The Basilica of St. Augustine has a red tile roof and white walls, indicative of the Spanish mission architectural style. The walls are made of coquina, which is a natural sedimentary stone made from broken bits of compressed seashells. In the 1800s, New York City architect James Renwick Jr. enlarged the church to feature a rectangular-cruciform shape. Wirestock Creators/Shutterstock

St. Augustine, Florida, is referred to as the “Ancient City” because it was founded a few hundred years before the United States was even a country. Interspersed with cobblestone streets and historic homes, the city boasts an austere 17th-century fortress and a grandiose basilica. While the congregation of the Basilica of St. Augustine was established when the town was founded in the 1500s—becoming the country’s first Catholic parish—the current church structures were constructed in the late 1700s and 1800s.

The basilica was designed between 1789 and 1793 by Spain’s royal engineer Mariano de la Rocque. The original part of the church was completed in 1797. Early Spanish settlers and leadership in St. Augustine influenced the basilica’s Spanish mission architectural style. In 19th-century expansion efforts, Renaissance designs were prominent, especially in the added bell tower. Common Spanish mission architectural elements include the curvilinear gables and arched openings for bells and statues, while the Renaissance style focused on symmetry and classical components, namely columns and pediments.

Size, history, and appearance are some of the criteria considered before a Catholic church is designated as a minor basilica. In 1976, St. Augustine’s church was bestowed with that designation. Aside from its historical and pastoral significance, some of its standout architectural features are its mission-style curving bell gables, red clay tiles that contrast with its white coquina walls, a statuary niche, stained glass windows, and an expansive nave with stenciled beams.

Four bells are on display in the arched niches of the basilica's entrance façade. Another arched niche, centrally located, features a statue of St. Augustine. Classical architectural design is present in the doorway’s broken pediment supported by double flanking fluted columns. Both the church and the bell tower are topped with looming crosses that can be seen from vantage points all around the town; the bell tower’s cross is also visible from the Atlantic Ocean. Fotogro/Shutterstock

The main interior nave—where parishioners sit or stand—is decorated primarily overhead. The ceiling is painted a saturated red and serves as a backdrop for ornately stenciled and gilded wooden cross beams. Some of the beams display elaborate, colorful coats of arms representing former St. Augustine bishops. Crown-design lighting hangs throughout the nave. Flanking the altar is a custom-built pipe organ sporting more than 3,000 pipes. Lindenwood statues, covered in gold leaf, of St. Peter on the right, St. Augustine on the left, and the risen Christ in the center, provide a dramatic setting for the altar. Nagel Photography/Shutterstock

In the 1960s, artist Hugo Ohlms painted murals for the basilica. One in the nave's rear depicts the history of Spanish exploration in Florida. Ohlms’s complex murals were painted on massive plywood panels and fitted together inside the church. Bill Perry/Shutterstock

Inside the cruciform, or cross-designed church, are transepts, meaning the transverse “arms” of the structure. Each side—east and west—is adorned with a large stained glass window, an arched doorway opening, and a decorative, geometrically apportioned ceiling. Tfloyd/CC BY-SA 3.0

This stained glass window, through which sunlight casts patterns of multiple colors inside the church, tells the story of the life of St. Augustine of Hippo. The German stained glass was installed in the west transept space of the church in 1909. Bill Perry/Shutterstock

When the church was enlarged in the late 1800s per the design of New York City architect James Renwick Jr., a six-story bell tower was added. While the bell tower sports a red tile roof, suggestive of Spanish mission style, the structure’s clear Renaissance architecture is found in the many carved columns with ornamental capitals, classic pediments, keystone-decked arches, and shell motifs. mahoneyfotos/Shutterstock

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