This is another post on staircases in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' Temples. Today I'll be briefly discussing baptismal font stairs.
Above from left to right are pictures of the baptismal font stairs in the Nauvoo Illinois Temple, St. George Utah Temple, Logan Utah Temple (original), Salt Lake Temple, Laie Hawaii Temple, and the Cardston Alberta Canada Temple. These staircases are typical of many temple stairs where one walks up to the font. Many have beautiful decorative railings. I like these staircases. I really like the intricate railing and step details used in the St. George Temple, Logan Temple and Salt Lake Temple. I also like that patrons get to use the stairs.
There are many temples with stairs around the font which only lead to the area around the oxen and which are only used for maintenance and cleaning. These can be seen in the Jordan River Utah Temple, Ogden Utah Temple (at least before remodeling started), Provo Utah Temple, remodeled Logan Utah Temple, and many others. Most of these are really plain, but one stands out. The Washington D.C. Temple font has two curved staircases that have obviously been planned to work with the look of the font and I think they add a lot to the temple and enhance the baptistry.
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| Washington D.C. Temple Baptistry |
Those are a few baptistry staircases.
The staircases at the Washington, D.C. Temple are never used in the normal course of performing baptisms. Patrons enter from above. The stairs going down to the level of the oxen can be used for maintenance, cleaning, and so forth, but people being baptized don't go up and down them.
ReplyDeleteYou may also be interested to know that the baptistry has been significantly redesigned since this original photo was taken. The dark blue carpet is no longer there, and the font is no longer a simple white; it has a green and gold motif added around the outside of the bowl.
I assumed the stairs were only used for cleaning, but I'm glad that rather than not putting any detail into them for that reason, they instead laid them out nicely.
ReplyDeleteThe gold and green design sounds interesting, but I always loved how the blue carpet looked and think it is a shame to lose it.
I think there's more symbolism behind them than just easy access for cleaning. In jordan river I know there's a door behind the font, (maybe it's for something else), but I always assumed that was for cleaning.
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