St. Francis Xavier Catholic Church: Stone Cladding, Cornices, Banding, Coping

Project: St. Francis Xavier Catholic Church
Location: Stillwater, Oklahoma
Architect: Franck & Lohsen Architects
General Contractor: Nabholz Construction
Masonry Contractor: Sun Valley Masonry
Completion Date: 3/6/2018

The St. Francis Xavier Catholic Church is located in the prairie landscape on the edge of the bustling college town of Stillwater, OK. The designers had developed detailed large size profiles with precise, intricate design details to give the building a level of ornamentation appropriate for an American Gothic church.

The AAS team combined three different types of product – dry vibrant-tamp cast stone, architectural wet-pour precast, and GFRC. The applications for the project included large size spires, detailed arches, window ornamentation, bandings, cornices, wall coping, architectural trim, etc. to achieve the design intent.

The designers had developed large size profiles with precise, intricate design details to give the building a level of ornamentation appropriate for an American Gothic church.

The AAS team worked closely with the architect and contractor for the project early in the design phase to review CAD drawings and confirm design feasibility.

The team recommended combining three different stone materials for the precast limestone:

1. Wet-pour architectural precast concrete for large size pieces
2. Dry vibrant-tamp cast stone for the majority of the detail pieces that could be molded on both sides for seamless integration with the exterior veneer
3. Architectural GFRC (Glass Fiber Reinforced Concrete) for the cornices, coping at a higher elevation

The process of designing and fabricating each stone piece included pre-engineered anchorage conditions to achieve the minimal design aesthetic of monolithic stone.

The customer got detailed drawings to understand the installation details for the stone pieces.

• AAS developed color samples for all three product materials to precisely match texture and finish.
• With fully automated, computerized batch plants, the structural and aesthetic properties of the stone products were consistently maintained for all phases of the building.
• The AAS team developed custom molds using CNC technology.
• The stone cladding ornamentation with large stone pieces and intricate design details required extensive detailed mold work throughout the project.
• The church is crowned with a pair of towers and spires with the cross on the tallest spire reaching the height of 157’, making it visible for several miles. The large spires for the church weighed over 7,000 pounds.
• The manufacturing schedule for different phases of the project was lined up to synchronize with the construction milestones.
• The installation team got a settings plan with a detailed numbering system to identify the specific placement location of every single stone piece delivered by AAS.
• The customer was able to track each stone piece individually using the fully automated tagging system of AAS.