Providence Methodist Church
National Register Listing
Street Address:
4833 Old State Road, Holly Hill, SC (Orangeburg County)
Alternate Name:
Providence United Methodist Church
NRHP Nomination
Record Number:
S10817738041
Description and Narrative:
Providence Methodist Church, constructed in 1919-20, is significant architecturally as an outstanding and remarkable example of an early twentieth-century Neo-Classical sanctuary in rural lower South Carolina. The church was designed by the renowned Columbia, South Carolina architect Charles Coker Wilson, one of the most successful and influential South Carolina architects of the early twentieth century. The church building, inclusive of the sanctuary and rear educational/administrative wings, is laid out in a slightly modified cruciform plan and features a gable-front, temple-form, edifice with a central tetrastyle portico, simplified Roman Doric order limestone columns, pilasters and entablature, a boxed cornice with pedimented gables, numerous bull’s eye windows, and remarkable large stained glass Palladian windows. In particular, its outstanding sanctuary windows, which church members insist were purchased from Louis Comfort Tiffany’s studio at the time of construction, make the church a noteworthy property combining Wilson’s fine church architecture with outstanding examples of early twentieth-century art glass. To the rear of the church is a large cemetery that contributes to the significance of the property. It contains the burial plots of more than 400 parishioners and community members dating to 1856, though fewer than fifteen individuals were buried there prior to 1880. Listed in the National Register September 25, 2009.
Period of Significance:
1856 – 1920;1856;1920
Level of Significance:
Local
Area of Significance:
Architecture
National Register Determination:
listed
Date of Certification:
September 25 2009
