St. Fronleichnam Church, Modernist parish church in Aachen-Mitte, Germany.
St. Fronleichnam is a 1929/30 church by Rudolf Schwarz consisting of a white, flat-roofed cuboid main nave and a separate 40-metre bell tower with a square plan. Inside, white plastered walls and a plain white altar wall contrast with black natural stone on the altar and floor and dark seating. A low side aisle on the north-east long side serves as a confessional and Stations of the Cross chapel.
St. Fronleichnam was built in 1929/30 for the growing parish of St. Josef in Aachen's eastern workers' district. The design by Rudolf Schwarz, then director of the Aachen school of arts and crafts, was initially rejected by the Cologne vicariate and the city building authority, but approval came in March 1930 after the city's art advisory board intervened. The topping-out ceremony followed in August 1930 and the church was consecrated on 21 December 1930. It was Schwarz's first completed church.
Locals call the white cube-shaped church "St. Makei", from the regional word for quark, a nickname earned by its plain white block. Inside, the furnishings came from a Werkgemeinschaft of teachers and pupils of the Aachen Kunstgewerbeschule: Fritz Schwerdt made the ivory crucifix and chalice with rock-crystal knop, Wilhelm Rupprecht the Stations of the Cross, Hans Schwippert the seating and organ front.
The church stands in Aachen's eastern quarter, in Aachen-Mitte. The main cube and the 40-metre campanile are separate volumes, so walk around the block to see how the tower is set off from the nave. The low side aisle on the north-east long side holds the confessional and Stations of the Cross; look for the small colourless windows high on the long walls.
The church is nicknamed St. Makei, from the regional word for quark, because of its white, block-like shape. Its 40-metre bell tower holds a bronze bell cast in 1931 by the Otto foundry in Hemelingen; it weighs about 2,000 kilograms and sounds the note cis′.
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