Reincarnation of a Church (Photo- Marina Khrustaleva)
There are not many vacant church buildings in Los Angeles. The Trinity Swedish Evangelical Lutheran Church at 570 E. Orange Grove Ave in Pasadena was vacant from about 2019 to 2023.
By Marina Khrustaleva
The Swedish community living in Victorian cottages along Madison Street beginning the end of the 19th century slowly dissolved. The property was transferred to the Reformation Church, but it never functioned, due to COVID or other reasons.
The original frame structure for the Svenska Evangeliska Lutherska Trefaldighets Kyrkan was built in 1915. A new masonry Gothic Revival building was erected in 1924. At that time, it was one of four Swedish churches in Pasadena, all of them within a one-mile radius. This one was designed by architect Clarence Eugene Noerenberg and his associate Harold S. Johnson. Noerenberg specialized in reinforced concrete construction. He also designed Burbank Junior High School and two public libraries, Edendale and Helen Hunt Jackson branches, both later converted into churches, Ukrainian and Hispanic respectively.
Trinity congregation was wealthy enough to commission a substantial edifice with a bell tower, large stained-glass opalescent windows, solid wood doors with brass hardware, and a massive organ. In 1933, the church was renamed Messiah Lutheran Church; Swedish-language services continued until 1938. In 1957, the red-brick mid-century Fellowship Hall was added to the west of the sanctuary to house community and educational activities. By 2019, the property was abandoned, vertical windows on the tower boarded up, and some of the stained-glass windows damaged. It was on the market for quite a while, with some redevelopment projects jeopardized by rigid R-16 zoning.
History and architectural merit matter
But miracles happen, and the church site began a new cycle of spiritual life. In October 2023, the site reopened as Tai Ji Men Qigong Academy offering meditation and breathwork classes. This Taoist institution with Taiwanese origins has 21 branches all over the world, and now four of them in California. Surprisingly, the sanctuary at Orange Grove was chosen as the world headquarters. Guess why? Because of the significance of the building – one more proof that history and architectural merit matter.
Tai Ji Men community has seriously invested in revitalizing the former church: reroofed the building, replaced the windows (mainly with wood ones, with a small amount of vinyl), repainted the building white and restored broken stained glass; the organ is under repair. Several centerpieces of the windows bearing Christian symbols: a dove, a cross, a torch, and an anchor, have been replaced with the Academy’s logo, a yin-yang symbol in a five-petal flower. Supposedly, the original inserts have been preserved.
Tai Ji Men Qigong Academy at 570 E. Orange Grove Ave (Photos- Marina Khrustaleva)
The Trinity Swedish Evangelical Lutheran Church (Photo- Marina Khrustaleva)
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