Wayfarers Chapel Carillon
Posted by: 
brwhiz
N 33° 44.611 W 118° 22.632
11S E 372432 N 3734570
This Carillon is located at the Wayfarers Chapel at 5755 Palos Verdes Drive South in Rancho Palos Verdes, California.
Waymark Code: WMHXFR
Location: California, United States
Date Posted: 08/23/2013
Views: 6
The Carillon is a memorial dedicated to 16 people listed on a plaque mounted at the base of the carillon tower. Therte are 16 bells arranged in four levels of 4 bells each. The smallest bells are at the bottom with the largest bells being at the top.
From the National Register of Historic Places nomination document:
The bell tower, completed in 1954 and dedicated in December of that year, is, in itself, a masterpiece of design and engineering. The stele, rising fifty feet above the ground, has a foundation that reaches two stories below ground in order to provide stability. The exterior of the wing-like tower is sections of native Palos Verdes stone fastened into a concrete core with metal rods, creating a monolithic, steel-reinforced concrete structure with a face of stone from the environment. The stone ties the tower into the terrain, a critical aspect of organic architecture. The roof of the tower is covered with the same blue terra cotta tiles used on the Chapel roof. Wright chose the blue to blend with the sky as well as to maintain the scheme of utilizing only colors of nature in the Wayfarers Chapel complex. A gold leaf cross rises eleven feet from the top of the tower, and the winged shape of the stele provides the impression that upraised hands are holding the cross. The tower with the gold cross on top is called "God's Candle" by sailors as they see it illuminated by night from their ocean view. All of the subsequent buildings follow the same organic architectural precepts that Lloyd Wright employed in the design and building of the Chapel.