Touro Synagogue — Jewish New Orleans

The Byzantine Revival dome floats above St. Charles Avenue like an imported sky — seventy-one feet wide, visible from blocks away, designed by Emile Weil when he was twenty-nine years old. The synagogue was constructed in 1908 and dedicated on January 1, 1909. It's the third home of a congregation that consolidated in 1881 from two older communities that had split, reconciled, and ultimately named themselves for the merchant who bankrolled both. Judah Touro was the son of Isaac Touro, whose name marks the oldest synagogue in the country, in Newport, Rhode Island. The New Orleans congregation is one of the oldest in the United States and the oldest outside the original Thirteen Colonies. Shangarai Chasset — "Gates of Mercy" — was founded in 1828 as an Ashkenazi Orthodox congregation. Nefutzot Yehudah — "Dispersed of Judah" — was a Sephardic congregation founded in 1846 after a split from Shangarai Chasset. The two reunited in 1881, moved into a building on Carondelet Street, and took the Touro name. Judah Touro had been a benefactor of both congregations, in addition to Roman Catholic and Protestant charities. The merged congregation joined the Union for Reform Judaism in 1891. Weil worked with George Glover on the design. A religious school building, designed by Nathan Kohlman in the same general style and using the same materials, was completed adjacent to the synagogue in 1928. A multi-purpose addition was completed in 1963, designed by Robert Schenker in the Modernist style. The Norman Synagogue House, designed by Mark Baum and Lyons and Hudson in 1989, uses materials that blend with the original structure. In 2019, the congregation began a restoration of the sanctuary's interior, delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic. The St. Charles streetcar passes right in front. You can see the dome from the car window.