Wedding venue presents chapel design

Owners plan to replace building lost in fire

EAST HAMPTON — A local wedding venue and marina is seeking approval to construct a nondenominational chapel on the site of a building damaged by a fire last June.

Officials from St.

Clements Castle, on Portland-Cobalt

Road, which spans

Portland and East

Hampton, presented plans for the 10,781square-foot Roncalli

Chapel of the Angels to the Planning and

Zoning Commission earlier this month.

The commission has scheduled a public hearing on the application for March

7, Planning and Zoning official Jeremy

DeCarli said this week. The proposed two-story building would have the same footprint (external dimensions) as the banquet venue formerly on the site, DeCarli said.

However, it will have approximately 3,000 more square feet of interior space. “It would be an ecumenical church, which means that any religion could use it,” said Daniel J. Loos, president of the Roncalli Institute.

The chapel would be available for “all the normal uses of a church,” he said.

Beyond the chapel, which would contain a 150-seat sanctuary/fellowship room, the proposed new building would

“It would be an ecumenical church, which means that any religion could use it.” Daniel J. Loos, president of the Roncalli Institute

also include an office for the adjacent marina as well as restrooms accessible from outside by boaters.

The plans for the proposed structure also show a kitchen on the first floor and four administrative offices on the second floor (at least two of which would have bath suites), as well as a radio/TV office, DeCarli said.

Roncalli officials made only “a very brief presentation when they presented the plans,” DeCarli said. He anticipates the commission will be able to flesh out more details about the kitchen and second-floor offices during the hearing.

The five-acre site is located in a residential zone. “Churches are allowed by special permit in a residential zone,” DeCarli said.

The Roncalli Institute, the corporate entity that operates St. Clements, had sought a permit earlier this year to convert the existing building into a banquet facility. However, “a banquet facility is not allowable in a residential zone,” DeCarli said.

Town officials said the building was being used as banquet facility without a permit. The issue came to light when a fire erupted at the rear of the building during a wedding reception.

One guest suffered minor injuries in the early-afternoon fire, which both local and state fire officials said was most likely caused by an unattended pressure cooker.

Roncalli intends to use undamaged exterior walls

as well as the infrastructure, including water and septic systems, in construction of the new building, Loos said.

Loos said he does not yet have an estimate of how much the new building will cost. He is particularly looking forward to having the office at the marina. At present, the office is located on the main property.

The building was designed by George Fellner, the same architect who is responsible for many of the more recent structures on the castle property, Loos said. The drawings show a dramatic 209-foot front of the proposed new building, including a 189-foot main building and 20-foot wide covered patio.

DeCarli said the plans submitted by Loos show “features similar to the castle,” including a bell tower.

The original buildings on the property were designed by a New York architect, Sidney Algernon Bell, who modeled them on two structures in France: the Inn of William the Conqueror in Divers, France, and the Great Hall of the Chateau of Lageais, according to the history of the castle.

Roncalli was the given name of the man who became Pope John XXIII, Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli (1881-1963). Popular in life — and widely admired for his efforts during World War II to intervene to save Jews — John XXIII was canonized as a saint in 2014.