Climate and Environment

As Wayfarers Chapel Is Disassembled, A Costly Rebuild And Unending Land Movement Loom On The Horizon

Published May 29, 2024 11:04 AM

A construction worker wearing an orange vest looks up at a geometric wood and glass building. The worker is standing on a blue crane.

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Weeks into an ambitious plan to disassemble the historic Wayfarers Chapel in Rancho Palos Verdes, officials are peeling the building apart like an onion as the land movement that spawned the work continues to accelerate.

City officials say the land where the chapel is located has been moving around 7 inches a week for the past few months. That’s compared to the period of October 2021 to October 2022, when the land moved at a rate of around 0.08 inches a week.

That acceleration has fueled a sense of earnestness regarding the disassembly and storage of the iconic building, which is beloved by thousands, many of whom have personal connections to the property.

When Arnold V. Strong was courting his now wife, she asked him to turn into the Wayfarers Chapel one day on the way to work. When he asked her why this particular place, she replied, “I just figured if anyone ever wanted to marry me, they'd marry me here.”

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The couple got married at the chapel five years ago.

“It does make you feel very crestfallen, very heartbroken,” Strong said of the building’s deterioration from the shifting land.

The process of disassembling the chapel

When the land movement forced the closure of the chapel in February, Megan Turner, project manager with S. L. Leonard & Associates, said the team looked at disassembly as a way to preserve the chapel’s National Historic Landmark status. As each element is carefully removed, they’re cataloged before being stored at an undisclosed location in Rancho Palos Verdes. The painstaking process will allow the Wayfarers Chapel to be reassembled to much of its former glory.

A close up of a construction worker wearing a bright orange long sleeve shirt, orange safety vest, white safety helmet, and safety gloves taking apart a brick floor and stacking those bricks on pallets.

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“It's really going in reverse order of how this thing was originally constructed and just making sure that each component is removed in the appropriate order so that all the pieces behind it are in the best condition possible,” Turner said.

The process began around two weeks ago with the exterior wood doors, the gold leaf-plated glass and original hardware removed and salvaged. The blue tile roof at the colonnade has also been disassembled and crated.

Workers have also started removing the uncracked glass panes by hand.

A construction worker on a blue boom lift next to a chapel made of glass and wood.

Next week, workers will begin assembling custom built cradles to support the wood vents in an upright position. Turner said the 16 arches that make up the vertical archway system that supports the chapel and creates “that incredible tree chapel feeling” will be moved off site by mid-June. The vents will be inspected on a quarterly basis to make sure the material does not become brittle.

Despite the land movement and the chapel’s proximity to the ocean, Turner said there’s no historical element of the chapel that can’t be salvaged because of the upkeep church officials have maintained over the years.

The redwood grove around the chapel

Some of the trees in the redwood grove that surrounds Wayfarers Chapel had to be removed to accommodate the disassembly.

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The trees that had to be cut down, Turner said, will be used to create objects and sculptures that will be sold off to support the disassembly and reconstruction process.

A construction worker wearing an orange safety vest and white safety helmet power washes square orange and red pieces of roofing.

Disassembly is estimated to cost around $500,000 for now, with some of the funds coming from a GoFundMe started by church officials. Other funding is coming from money put aside by church officials for restoration work. Turner said that figure could go up because of the offsite storage fees the chapel is incurring.

Next steps and reconstruction

Rebuilding the chapel is set to cost around $20 million, Turner said.

After disassembly is complete, crews will assess the grounds to see if the church can be reconstructed on the original site. But with the speed at which the ground is moving, the odds aren’t good.

Broken glass on a chapel made of stone and glass panes.

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“We are currently looking at a number of sites and working with the city of Rancho Palos Verdes to find locations,” Turner said. “Nothing is ever going to compare to our current location, but we are finding some that are as closely comparable as possible to be able to create, to recreate the same feeling.”

Spiritual connections

Reverend David Brown, the lead chapel minister at Wayfarers Chapel, is holding out hope for “the healing of the land, the healing of the entire landslide complex, the healing of our planet.”

The chapel, he said, has transcended its denomination of the Swedenborgian Church and Christianity and has served as a place of meditation and reflection for people from all walks of life. But, he said, the land movement is forcing another realization.

A broken concrete and stone staircase next to asphalt with poles that are bent from stone damage.

“We're re-realizing what's truly important, which is the church individual, which is each body temple ... is still tended for and we're still together as a community and that part remains intact and is incredibly valuable for the local community that has been gathering for so long at Wayfarers Chapel,” Brown said.

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