Immanuelkirche

Wuppertal-Barmen's Immanuelskirche lost its congregation in 1984, when the Lutheran and Reformed parishes merged and the building became surplus. Demolition was proposed; a preservation society took it on instead, and the church has worked ever since as a concert hall. It was designed by the Hamburg architect Ernst Heinrich Glüer, who won the competition of 1866, and consecrated on 27 May 1869 — neo-Gothic without, but carried within on iron and timber in the manner of the valley's factory building, so that the interior reads as industrial architecture that happens to be sacred. The Schuke organ installed in 1967, fifty-four stops across four manuals and pedal, remains the largest church instrument in the city, and recordings are regularly made beneath its pipes.