One and Half Centuries of Church Architecture in Ibadan, Nigeria

By the end of the 19th century, the missionaries had successfully planted Christianity in Ibadan, Nigeria with its distinguishable architecture. The history of church architecture in Ibadan is synonymous with the beginning of Christianity in Yoruba Country. Based on historical data obtained from the archives and field investigations, the paper traces the development of the church buildings of the missionary churches in Ibadan from the late 19th century to early 21st century. With shifts in the thinking about ideological and liturgical issues in church architecture globally, three distinct phases of development of church buildings in Ibadan are suggested beginning with the mission stations and ending with the modernist church buildings. The paper concludes that attempts to introduce modern architectural expressions in church buildings in Ibadan were increasingly common and strong but traditionalist and historicist approaches to architectural planning of church buildings remained predominant into the 21st century.