There’s a remarkable property at the corner of Baymiller and York streets in Cincinnati’s West End that stops people in their tracks. From the outside, it still looks exactly like what it is: a Gothic Revival church built in 1866. But step inside, and you’ll find something that redefines what a home can be.
The former York Street Methodist Episcopal Church — which once packed its pews on Christmas Eve and hosted neighborhood concerts and community gatherings throughout the late 1800s — sat vacant for a decade before a 2021 renovation converted it into a nearly 9,000-square-foot residence. Cincinnati Magazine recently featured the property, and for anyone who cares about architecture, historic preservation, or the possibilities of creative residential design, it’s worth a close look.
Adaptive Reuse at Its Most Ambitious
Church-to-residential conversions are among the most challenging — and most rewarding — projects in architecture. The structural bones of a 19th-century Gothic church were designed for communal gathering, not daily domestic life. Soaring ceiling heights, open nave floors, pointed arch windows, and a complete absence of typical residential compartmentalization all have to be thoughtfully reconciled with how people actually live.
The West End project embraces this tension rather than fighting it. Rather than softening the Gothic Revival architecture, the renovation leans fully into it — a black, monochromatic interior palette lets the drama of the space come forward, while allowing the colorful panes of numerous stained-glass windows to command attention rather than disappear into the background.
That’s a bold design decision, and the right one. When a space has authentic historic character, the worst thing you can do is dilute it with conventional finishes. The architecture is the design.
Solving the Scale Problem
Nearly 9,000 square feet is a lot of house. In a conventional home, that kind of square footage is organized across multiple floors with defined rooms. In a former sanctuary, it’s a single enormous volume — which presents real challenges for privacy, function, and livability.
The solution here is elegant: the main floor contains two independent apartments, each with two bedrooms, three bathrooms, laundry, an office, living and dining rooms, and a kitchen — a configuration that works equally well for multi-generational living, short-term rental, or long-term income property.
The primary residence occupies the upper sanctuary, where a cathedral ceiling soars overhead and light pours through pointed arch stained-glass windows — hallmarks of Gothic architecture that here serve as the defining features of an extraordinary living space. The kitchen is tucked into an alcove at one end, where a cathedral window stretching nearly floor-to-ceiling bathes it in golden light. On the opposite end, a loft provides additional recreation space, while a movable wall below it reveals a moody, possibility-rich organ room.
These aren’t compromises — they’re inventions. The architects found ways to create intimacy and function within a space that was never designed for either.
What This Project Teaches Us About Residential Architecture
At Springhouse, we work on projects across a wide spectrum — new custom homes, additions, renovations, and historically sensitive remodels. What we find again and again is that the best residential architecture starts with a willingness to listen to what a space is telling you.
The West End church could have been gutted and rebuilt as a conventional loft. Instead, the project honored 160 years of history while solving real problems of scale, livability, and function. The result is something genuinely irreplaceable.
That’s what good architecture does. It doesn’t just answer the question of how to build — it asks what a space can become.
In its 160-year history, 1835 Baymiller St. survived fires, vandalization, and years of vacancy. Today it stands as one of the most compelling residences in Cincinnati — proof that preservation and innovation aren’t opposing forces. They’re partners.
If you’re thinking about a renovation, an addition, or a home that goes beyond the expected, we’d love to talk. Schedule a free call with the Springhouse team and let’s explore what your space could become.