The domes atop St. Mary’s Orthodox Church in Westover have a shiny new coat of gold paint.
If you’ve driven through Westover in the past month or so—especially on a sunny day—you’ve surely noticed the glow coming off of the gold domes of St. Mary’s Orthodox Church, at the sharp Holland Avenue turn near the Westover Bridge. Last painted a couple decades ago, the domes were still eye-catching, but their luster had dulled over time. The fresh paint job is, by contrast, spectacular.
The work was contracted by St. Mary’s Orthodox parishioner George Atallah. A master electrician and electrical and general contractor doing business under the name GA Electric, Atallah submitted the lowest bid. “It’s my church,” he says of his proposal. “I’m not going to make a profit off of my church!”
Atallah hired a painter he works with often and rented an 85-foot lift. The domes were in good shape, he says, so the work consisted of sanding the domes, priming them, then giving them two coats of special gold metallic paint and finishing with a protective coat of urethane.
How much special gold paint did it take? Well, how big are the domes? It’s hard to tell, from all the way down here. The bigger dome is over 16 feet across, Atallah says. Two coats on the two domes and the crosses above them took 5 gallons. “It was quite scary,” he says of the painter’s experience on the lift. “He was standing at the maximum, 85 feet high, and barely touching the top of the crosses.” Combine that with workdays in the 90s, and it was a challenging project.
A member of the American Carpatho-Russian Orthodox Diocese of North America, St. Mary’s Orthodox Church is is one of the few Eastern Orthodox churches in West Virginia. The golden domes symbolize the light of God and the divine connection between heaven and earth, says Father Thomas Slosky, parish priest at St. Mary’s Orthodox. “They are often seen as a representation of spiritual enlightenment, guiding believers toward the divine. The domes also add to the aesthetic and architectural distinctiveness of Orthodox churches, making them recognizable symbols of faith.” This church was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1988.
“We are very proud,” Atallah says of the domes’ new gleam. “The job came out very nice, and we got a lot of compliments.” After the domes were painted, he says, St. Mary’s Holy Protection Byzantine Church on Listravia Avenue in Sabraton got in touch to ask about the work. So maybe some time soon we’ll have another freshly painted gold dome in town.
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