Christian Science Center
The Christian Science Center occupies a prominent site in Boston’s Back Bay, where religious, architectural, and urban design traditions converge within a large public plaza environment. The complex developed over several decades beginning with the Original Mother Church in 1894 and the domed Mother Church Extension completed in 1906, reflecting architectural influences drawn from Romanesque, Renaissance, and Byzantine traditions. The site later expanded in the twentieth century to include the Christian Science Publishing House and the Mary Baker Eddy Library, establishing the location as the international headquarters of the Christian Science church founded by Mary Baker Eddy in the nineteenth century.
The modern plaza, designed in the late 1960s and early 1970s by I.M. Pei & Partners and Araldo Cossutta, introduced a monumental reflecting pool and surrounding structures arranged within a carefully composed urban landscape. The long reflecting pool, one of the most recognizable open spaces in Boston, creates a visual axis that connects historic church buildings with modernist architecture characterized by geometric forms and exposed concrete surfaces associated with the Brutalist movement. The resulting composition integrates religious architecture with twentieth-century urban design, producing one of the city’s most distinctive civic environments.
The Christian Science Center contributes to understanding how architecture, landscape design, and religious history intersect within the urban fabric of Boston. The combination of historic ecclesiastical structures and modern plaza design reflects evolving approaches to civic space during the twentieth century. The reflecting pool and surrounding buildings illustrate the relationship between architectural expression and the broader cultural history of Boston as a center of intellectual and religious development.
