West End Collegiate Church and School ARCHITECT: Robert W. Gibson DATE: 1892-93 STYLE: Dutch Renaissance, Flemish Renaissance The West End Collegiate Church and School are a well-integrated group of buildings executed in a uniform style of architecture providing an accent of quaint charm among the surrounding high-rise apartments of West End Avenue. Since the Church and School trace their origins back to the first Dutch community in New York, the architect, Robert W. Gibson, appropriately combined elements of Dutch and Flemish Renaissance styles for his design. This group of buildings is one of the few good examples of this character in the City.

The Dutch origins of New York City are still visible in any number of places: neighborhood names, the city's flag, and its architecture. If you were to mention Dutch Colonial architecture to most New Yorkers, they might tell you about the centuries-old farmhouses that still dot the outer boroughs. But the Dutch-influenced architecture of the city did not end with gambrel-roofed, wood-frame homes, and it did not end at the colonial period. This list highlights some of the "other" type of Dutch Colonial architecture. The buildings noted here date from the actual colonial period in only a few cases but were largely constructed in the later as a Dutch Colonial Revival recalling New York's 17th century past.

Like the other collegiate Churches that descended from the Dutch reformed Church of New Amsterdam, the West End Collegiate Church's Dutch origins are evident in the architecture. Built in the Colonial Revival style, its steep gables were modeled after a 1606 building, the meat market (Vleeshal) in the Dutch town of Haarlem. West End Collegiate Church also boasts stained-glass windows and plaques that commemorate its links with The Netherlands and the House of Orange.