Secret Spot: Pilsen's Ghost Church

Art is everywhere in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago, especially where you least expect it. One local church no longer serves as a house of worship, yet it remains a powerful statement.

Unexpected Sight

Zion Evangelical Lutheran looks normal from afar. The brick building stretches from 19th Street to its clock tower 90 feet above. However, empty windows frame the sky where you expect to see stained glass. Around the side of the building, the sturdy front wall is all that’s left of the structure. It looks more like a stage prop than a place to worship.

A Moving Visit

It was built in 1880 with all four walls and a congregation to fill it. Eventually, the neighborhood’s German residents moved elsewhere abandoning the church in 1956. It suffered a fire in 1979 and was almost destroyed by a windstorm in 1998. Owner and Pilsen developer John Podmajersky Jr., received a fateful visit the day after the storm. Descendants of the church’s congregation gave him a book outlining the church’s history in German.

Unusual Garden

“It was very moving,” Podmajersky told the Tribune in 2000. “And it was that day I committed to save the tower no matter what.” He restored the church’s tower and facade and added a skylight where the tower’s roof would be. He planned to add artist studios to the site, but the plot is currently home to pieces of foundation. They stand in the grass as an eerie of sculptural garden.

Many locals refer to the site as “The Sanctuary.” What might have been the burnt shell of a building has been preserved as a symbol of the neighborhood’s past and a surprising installation for those who pass by.