Unitarian Church, Parsonage and Apartments,, Brassó

In January 1933, the young Unitarian congregation of Brașov approached Károly Kós through the mediation of Kálmán Kovács, a teacher from Cluj, regarding the design of a new church. Kós initially responded with a sketch proposal. On 23 February, the congregation requested a more detailed design by the 28th of the month, explaining that “a committee has been formed… proposals are being requested from several architects… and the most suitable design will receive the commission.”

The outcome of this competition is clarified by a letter sent by the Unitarian Church to Kálmán Halász, a Brașov-based architect who had also participated:

“Your design is the most sympathetic… but objections were raised regarding its style… The church authorities entrusted the full development to the author of the work deemed most appropriate in stylistic terms.”

It is evident that this refers to Kós’s proposal. By late May 1933, eight execution and permit drawings at 1:100 scale had already been completed. Kós sent two copies to Pastor Lajos Kovács in Brașov, accompanied by a pencil perspective drawing, and one copy to master builder Andor Demény. Apart from a foundation drawing, only the pencil perspective dated May survives; nevertheless, these documents sufficiently convey the core concept of the design.

Stylistically, the project shows affinities with Kós’s Reformed Commercial School in Brașov (1931) and the Kunsthalle (Műcsarnok) in Cluj, designed in 1930 and built in 1943. A two-storey Reformed prayer house built in Brașov in 1934, now destroyed, likely belonged to this same architectural group. It is undeniable that the modernist spirit, particularly influential in Romania at the time, also affected Kós’s work—an influence reinforced by the Bauhaus-oriented Halász group active in Brașov. Yet, as the competition outcome demonstrates, Kós’s design managed to articulate a distinct alternative to local modernist proposals, even if both his and Halász’s works appear modern from today’s perspective.

The L-shaped corner building repeats one of Kós’s favored compositional schemes: two wings unified by a tower. Comparable examples include the Székely National Museum in Sfântu Gheorghe and the unbuilt Kalotaszeg Museum project of 1935. The main entrance was placed adjacent to the tower. Although the wings are similar in size, variations in window proportions express internal functions externally. One wing accommodated the large assembly spaces, while the other contained a revenue-generating residential block, intended to be financed from non-church sources.

According to Pastor Lajos Kovács’s description, the planned functions were as follows:

The minimum scheme covered a built area of 24 × 12–14 m, equivalent to the prayer hall footprint. The basement included storage spaces, youth and women’s association rooms with movable partitions, and a caretaker’s apartment. The ground floor contained two apartments, a pastoral office, and a room for the assistant pastor; the upper level housed the prayer hall, which could also serve as a lecture space. A more ambitious version added permanent apartments and a shop along Kút Street. The main façade and entrance were oriented toward the southwest, facing the slope.

On 7 August, Kós was informed that although permission was sought for the entire complex, only the church wing would initially be built. This necessitated significant design modifications, which conflicted with Kós’s original integrated concept. By October 1933, it became clear that construction could only begin the following year. Despite ongoing correspondence and growing impatience from the congregation—expressed in increasingly urgent letters in early 1934—Kós finally submitted the revised plans on 13 April 1934, noting only minor corrections to the basement and ground floor layouts.

Construction commenced shortly thereafter. The first groundbreaking took place one week later, and the foundation stone was laid on 29 April 1934. However, once the concrete foundations reached ground level, the Romanian Ministry of the Interior halted the works and revoked the building permit. Similar interruptions occurred elsewhere in Kós’s career, notably with the Bábony school project. Many of his designs were either never realized or left unfinished due to interwar political conditions.

Despite attempts at political intervention—even involving negotiations with the Brașov Saxon community—the project was never resumed on this site. As compensation, the congregation received another plot farther from the city center. There, in 1935, a reinforced-concrete modern church–parsonage complex designed by Kálmán Halász was erected. This building, which still stands today, represents a clear example of Bauhaus-influenced architecture as practiced in Brașov at the time.

(Gall 1995, Országépítő, 1., 62–63. old.)