Church of the Heavenly Rest
2 East 90th Street | also 1085 5th Avenue | Carnegie Hill | built 1929
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The city photographed every building for its tax records around 1940 and again in the 1980s. NYC Municipal Archives.
Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.
- 1924
Heavenly Rest buys the Carnegie lot with a 75-foot height limit
Rector Henry Darlington asks Louise Carnegie to sell the southeast corner of Fifth Avenue and 90th Street. Andrew Carnegie had paid $1.7 million for it in 1917, partly to keep a tall building from shading his garden across the street. She agrees, and the purchase is completed in November 1924, limiting the land through 1975 to a church no taller than 75 feet. The congregation then merges with Beloved Disciple on 89th Street.
Source: nycago.org
- 1926
Construction of the present church begins on All Saints' Day
Work starts on All Saints' Day 1926 on a design by Hardie Phillip of Mayers, Murray & Phillip, which succeeded Bertram Goodhue Associates. The congregation had sold its midtown property in 1925 and spent the next four years worshipping at the Church of the Beloved Disciple on 89th Street. The first organ in the new building, a 75-rank Austin instrument, was installed in 1928 and 1929 as construction neared completion.
Source: nycago.org
- 1929
The church is dedicated on Easter Day with an open plan
The Church of the Heavenly Rest is dedicated on Easter Day, March 31, 1929. Engineering innovations allow an open plan in which every part of the interior can be seen by everyone who enters. The nave is lit by stained glass windows showing the principal events of the Christian year, with a rose window above the reredos.
Source: heavenlyrest.org
- 1929
A stripped-down neo-Gothic design in Indiana limestone leaves two-thirds of its sculpture uncarved
Hardie Phillip's design is a spare neo-Gothic building with Art Moderne touches, contrasting broad expanses of Indiana limestone with areas of delicate tracery. Two squat towers frame the Fifth Avenue entrance, which has a large stained glass window and sculpture by Lee Lawrie. A 50-foot reredos designed by Earl Thorp and carved by Edward Ardolino rises behind the altar. The $3.2 million complex seats about 1,100, but about two thirds of the planned sculptures were never executed.
Source: nycago.org
- 1929
The Chapel of the Beloved Disciple is dedicated by Bishop Manning
Bishop William T. Manning, assisted by Rector Henry Darlington, dedicates the 200-seat chapel on June 23, 1929. It keeps the name of the Church of the Beloved Disciple, founded in 1870 at 67 East 89th Street, and was paid for with proceeds from selling that church to the Harlem Reformed congregation. Its reredos is made of opus sectile by Powell Studios of London.
Source: nycago.org
- 1983
The ashes of film star Gloria Swanson are interred at the church
Gloria Swanson dies of a heart ailment in New York Hospital on April 4, 1983, shortly after coming back from her home on the Portuguese Riviera. Her body is cremated, and her ashes are placed in the Church of the Heavenly Rest, which stands on Fifth Avenue. Only a small number of relatives attend the interment.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1993
A three-alarm electrical fire destroys the organ console and choir stalls
A three-alarm electrical fire breaks out before dawn on Saturday, August 7, 1993, on the south side of the chancel, where it burns up the organ console and choir stalls along with woodwork and a pair of stone arches. Firefighters vent the building well enough to save the windows, though soot coats the interior. Most of the organ's roughly 8,000 pipes survive, and Guilbault-Therien of Quebec builds a new five-manual console.
Source: nycago.org
- 1997
The church appears in The Devil's Advocate under a different name
A scene of the 1997 film The Devil's Advocate, with Keanu Reeves, Charlize Theron and Al Pacino in the cast, takes place at the church. The film calls it the Church of the Heavenly Hope rather than by its real name. In real life the church is on Museum Mile, at Fifth Avenue and 90th Street, across from Central Park and the Carnegie Mansion.
“The church is featured in a scene in the 1997 film The Devil's Advocate, but under the name Church of the Heavenly Hope…”
Source: Wikipedia
- 2021
The church is listed on the National Register of Historic Places
The Church of the Heavenly Rest is added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2021. The limestone building was designed by Mayers, Murray & Phillip, successors to Bertram Goodhue, who died before the first stone was laid. It opened at Easter 1929 at a cost of $3.2 million.
“The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2021.”
Source: Wikipedia
Further reading
- Church of the Heavenly RestWikipedia
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