Landmark church gets new life with QUIKRETE

Words: Chad CorleyA local treasure dating back more than a century, El Bethel Missionary Baptist Church was transformed into a public park memento after falling victim to an arson attack in 2007. Epoxy Design Systems successfully repurposed much of the remaining structure as a park pavilion in a manner that reflects the original architecture of the church by using QUIKRETE Shotcrete MS.

Originally built in 1889, El Bethel Missionary Baptist Church served the post-Civil War community of Houston’s Fourth Ward until being replaced with a new sanctuary in 1997. Unfortunately, the vacant church burned down in 2007 in a case that remains unresolved today. Several years later, the City of Houston purchased the remains with plans to convert the area into a park memorializing the church, which is on the National Register of Historic Places and is one of the oldest sanctuaries in Houston.

Epoxy Design Systems removed all the unsalvageable elements of the three standing walls, made the necessary structural concrete repairs and reinforced the surface with wire mesh before spray-applying more than 7,000 square feet of QUIKRETE Shotcrete MS on the adaptive reuse project. In addition to renovating and stabilizing the church, Epoxy Design Systems successfully incorporated relief designs in the walls and returns around columns, doors and stained glass windows that recaptured the look and spirit of El Bethel Missionary Baptist Church. Today, visitors can sit on attractive brick pews in the symbolic, open-air church enjoying views of the adjacent park.

QUIKRETE Shotcrete MS is a single component Micro Silica-enhanced repair and restoration material that achieves a compressive strength of more than 9,000 PSI at 28 days, and features very low rebound and permeability characteristics. The QUIKRETE Cos. offers a full line of shotcrete products that can be applied through a wet or dry process to deliver the combination of high strength, high adhesion, low rebound and low sag. These characteristics make QUIKRETE Shotcrete MS ideal for use in rehabilitating bridges, tunnels, parking garages, ramps, piers, dams and other concrete structures.

More information on QUIKRETE products and projects is at www.quikrete.com.
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