Little Sanctuary Project
HEADMASTER JASON ROBINSON
Chapel centers and grounds us, providing a symbol of stability and enduring values that will never change. At the same time, it reminds us to look upwards and outwards, to pursue a life in service to ideals larger than oneself.
Artistic Renderings
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View from Senior Circle
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View Toward Altar and Manger Window
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Little Sanctuary Update
St. Albans is actively fundraising for the this project. If you would like to support the project or learn more, please contact Executive Director for Development & Alumni Relations Melanie Hoffmann (202-537-2355) or Director of Major Gifts Ted Pelonis (202-537-5790).
The Little Sanctuary project is right on schedule – with the school community returning to worship there and as of May 2025. As we hoped, the Upper School came back inside for the Senior Warden Chapel and the Last Senior Chapel of the year. The Lower School will follow.
The Rev. Brooks Hundlery, senior chaplain, wrote to the community: “It is customary when returning to a sacred space for the community to ask for God’s blessing upon it. And appropriately, we began asking God to bless the space with a prayer of dedication and with students singing one of our favorite hymns together. With our voices together in song we asked for God’s blessing on the chapel. It is so wonderful to share this news with the community and even more special to be back in our cherished chapel. As the hymn’s refrain reminds us, ‘God has done marvelous things, I too will praise him with a new song.’”
The Rev. Brooks Hundlery, senior chaplain, wrote to the community: “It is customary when returning to a sacred space for the community to ask for God’s blessing upon it. And appropriately, we began asking God to bless the space with a prayer of dedication and with students singing one of our favorite hymns together. With our voices together in song we asked for God’s blessing on the chapel. It is so wonderful to share this news with the community and even more special to be back in our cherished chapel. As the hymn’s refrain reminds us, ‘God has done marvelous things, I too will praise him with a new song.’”
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View Toward Blessing of the Animals Window in Tower
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View Toward Altar
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View Toward Organ from Beneath Tower
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The school and the construction team have strived to maintain the beauty of the original building—returning to a Vermont quarry to find tiles that will complement the current slate roof; searching for white- and charcoal-colored ceramic tiles to match the original flooring; re-creating the pebbledash stucco; working with a woodcarver to re-create the distinctive arched trusses that line the interior, and both refurbishing and finding a manufacturer to design matching new pews that will seat an additional 145, allowing our entire Upper School to be seated together in prayer for the first time in decades.
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Newly Carved Pew
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Samples of Pebble-Dash Stucco
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At the East End
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Crenellations on New Tower
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Central Tower
One highlight of the project has been working with skilled artisans to design new stained glass windows for our larger chapel. Many of the original windows incorporate abstract designs. Our chaplains, working with the artists, sought to introduce windows depicting biblical stories that resonate with our boys—Jonah and the Whale, the Good Samaritan, the Prodigal Son—as well as beloved moments in the life of our school and the church, such as the Blessing of the Animals. At this favorite fall chapel in honor of St. Francis, boys are invited to bring their pets; this year, the chaplains blessed dozens of dogs, a few cats, a rabbit, a snake, and a fish.
Music has always been an instrumental part of our chapels, and during this project the tubular chimes in the bell tower have been restored and updated so that they can be played manually or automatically. The historic chimes—a gift to the first bishop of Washington, the Right Rev. Henry Yates Satterlee, from a former parish—were in working condition, but several of the strikers needed to be sandblasted, hot-dip galvanized, and powder-coated black—and restored to their original quality so that “Men of the Future, Stand,” and other beloved hymns and carols may ring out across campus once again.
Integral to the project are complete upgrades to HVAC, electrical, audiovisual, wireless, and lighting systems. The school will replace and upgrade fire protections and alarms and will bring the building up to applicable code and life safety standards.
The goal of the project, according to architect Cal Bowie ’69, was to expand and bring up to date while ensuring all who return to the Little Sanctuary feel they are returning to a familiar place, the beloved chapel they knew as students. “I want alumni to step inside and say, ‘Wow, this is the Little Sanctuary I know and remember. When are you going to renovate it?’” Noted Headmaster Jason Robinson: “Chapel centers and grounds us, providing a symbol of stability and enduring values that will never change. At the same time, it reminds us to look upwards and outwards, to pursue a life in service to ideals larger than oneself.”
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Window of The Blessing of the Animals
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Refurbished Crucifix
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Located in Washington D.C., St. Albans School is a private, all boys day and boarding school. For more than a century, St. Albans has offered a distinctive educational experience for young men in grades 4 through 12. While our students reach exceptional academic goals and exhibit first-rate athletic and artistic achievements, as an Episcopal school we place equal emphasis upon moral and spiritual education.