Biggest Orthodox Church in the Balkans

[Djamila]

The biggest Orthodox Church in the Balkans is the Saint Sava Church in Belgrade, Serbia. The new one, that is.

This is it:

Want to know how big it is?

Well, how's this for a demonstration.

This is the size of a normal, Serbian Orthodox Church - which are quite large, really. The interior and exterior of the old Saint Sava Church in Belgrade:

And this is the new Saint Sava Church, side by side. Notice the old one in the bottom-left corner?
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Wow...
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[Djamila]

That still freaks me out, and these photos are two or more years old now... LOL

 

[PHOTOTAKER]

why? its massive... the heating bill has to be really, really high.

 

[Djamila]

why? its massive... the heating bill has to be really, really high.

It's just so big, just the pictures give me... I'll call it vertigo, but I know that's not it. Just the pictures make me a little nervous in my stomach and if I look at some upper level and think of standing there I have to turn away, even from the picture - hahaha. And I'm not paranoid of such things, or anything.

I imagine the heating bill would be alright. Most of the pictures I've seen from Orthodox Churches in the winter show them wearing their fur coats and winter clothes inside as well, so maybe they're just heated enough to prevent damage to the sacred things inside? I really don't know.

 

[James the Persian]

why? its massive... the heating bill has to be really, really high.

You've never been in an Orthodox church have you? The next one I come across that is heated will be the first.

James

 

[Quiddity]

I like Orthodox Church designs. I've often wondered what it is about the cylindrical design that attracts the East? RC Churches vary, but seem to be sharper [mechanically speaking] in design. More boxy and pointy looking.

 

[Djamila]

I like Orthodox Church designs. I've often wondered what it is about the cylindrical design that attracts the East? RC Churches vary, but seem to be sharper [mechanically speaking] in design. More boxy and pointy looking.

Well, it was their style. It's perhaps more associated with Osmanli Mosques today than Byzantine Churches but it still began with the latter.

It's also functional, aesthetic, and all of these things - historically proven to be such. But on top of it you just have the... association, you know?

I wear my eyeliner very thick because for me it means Bosnian and Muslim. I like the red tile roof on a mosque because, for me, it means Bosnian and Muslim.

And they like this church design for all those reasons and because it comes from their own.

 

[James the Persian]

I like Orthodox Church designs. I've often wondered what it is about the cylindrical design that attracts the East? RC Churches vary, but seem to be sharper [mechanically speaking] in design. More boxy and pointy looking.

Orthodox Churches vary a lot, too. Compare say, St Basil's (the Cathedral with the stripy onion domes in Moscow) to the one that Djamila's posted. Quite a few are built in the basilica style (see Haghia Sopia). Southern Romanian ones are quite distinctive (though similar in lay out to the Serbian ones) whereas northern ones have a somewhat Germanic influence on the towers. I would, in general, accept that RC churches tend to be boxier, but whether or not they are pointier, really does depend on the region you're referring to.

Here are a few all from Romania to show you the variation. The first is Voronet, one of Moldova's painted monastery churches, the second is the church I was married in, in Bucovina, and the third is Curtea de Arges, which is more typically southern, though with two unique twisted towers.