Zionskirche, Dresden

The Zionskirche is the name given to two Evangelical Lutheran church buildings in the Südvorstadt district of Dresden. The first, the Alte Zionskirche or Old Zion's Church was built by Schilling & Graebner from 1908 to 1912. This building was hit and badly damaged by fire during the bombing in February 1945. A temporary roof was later added and it is now preserved as a ruin, housing a lapidarium with 3000 sculptures. The parish, meanwhile, was housed in a barracks next to the ruins until the first stone of a new building (the Neue Zionskirche) was laid on Bayreuther Straße on 5 June 1981, as a gift from the Church of Sweden. With its construction overseen by Eberhard Burger, the new building was inaugurated on 31 October 1982.