Herbert Langford Warren
Herbert Langford Warren (1857 – 1917) designed the
Church of the Holy City in
Washington, DC. This Swedenborgian church, built in
the years 1894-96 and 1908,
stands in the midst of what is now the 16th Street
Historic District neighborhood in
Northwest Washington.
Warren’s biographer, Maureen Meister, has stated
that he was “an important link in the chain of
individuals who contributed to the architectural
practice, theories of design, and the teaching of
architectural history in the United States at the
turn of the twentieth century.” Warren founded the
School of Architecture at Harvard (now the Graduate
School of Design) and was a charter member and
long-time president of the Boston Society of Arts
and Crafts.
The qualities that distinguish Warren’s
architectural designs are aptly described in the
introduction to his posthumously published book The
Foundations of Classic Architecture. “He designed
with skill and restraint, and all his buildings are
marked by the same scrupulous regard for historic
precedent, consistency of character, and refinement
of detail.”
Born in England of an English mother and an American
father, a Swedenborgian missionary, Warren was a
founding member of the Swedenborgian church in
Cambridge, Massachusetts, established in 1888.
Catharine Clark Warren, Warren’s wife, was the
daughter of the Reverend James Reed, a notable
Swedenborgian minister in Boston.
Warren’s body of work, in addition to the church in
Washington, DC, includes two much admired
structures, the Swedenborg Chapel in Cambridge and
the Troy Orphan Asylum in Troy, New York.
For more information about Warren, see Architecture
and the Arts and Crafts Movement in Boston:
Harvard’s H. Langford Warren by Maureen Meister,
published by UPNE in 2003.
______
Quotes retrieved from: | 
