Flower Lane Church, Protestant church in Gulou District, Fuzhou, China
Flower Lane Church is a granite chapel on East Street in Gulou that can hold about 1000 people in its main hall. The building consists of older religious spaces and a modern addition built in 2014.
The church was founded in 1863 when the American Methodist Episcopal Mission arrived in Fuzhou and purchased property on East Street. The site today is where a former royal residence from the Ryukyuan kingdom once stood before being bought for religious purposes in 1915.
The name Siong Iu Dong (尚友堂) means "church for social intercourse"; the congregation ran Jinde School, a girls' middle school, and a kindergarten until the Japanese occupation ended school activities in the 1940s. Since 1979 the church has been known as Flower Lane Church, after its lane. Its new hall holds a 45-stop pipe organ used for public concerts.
The church stands at Flower Lane No. 7 by the Dongjiekou crossroads in Gulou District, a short walk from the East Street intersection. The 1938 granite chapel and the 2015 community centre next door are both working church buildings, so entry depends on services and events rather than fixed visiting hours.
The site was the Qing-era mansion of Zhao Xin, a Ryukyuan king, before the Methodist mission bought it in 1915. The congregation later grew to over 10,000, the largest in Fuzhou, and in 2015 a new hall with a 45-stop pipe organ was added beside the 1938 granite chapel.
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