Sacred Spaces in 360°

Click the images above to access immersive tours of Lily Reid Holt Memorial Chapel at Lake Forest College, optimized for computer, phones, and handheld devices, or optimized for VR headsets, e.g. Google Cardboard.

Built in 1899 and designed by architects Charles S. Frost and Alfred H. Granger, the Lily Reid Holt Memorial Chapel served as the primary location for Lake Forest College students' religious worship during the first half of the twentieth century.

Up until the 1920s, Lake Forest College students were required to attend chapel at least four times a week. However according to the College newspaper, The Stentor, despite these formal requirements, a religiously apathetic student body did not actually attend on a regular basis. From the early 1930s through the 40s, required services were held only once a week. The number of times students were required to attend services became even more relaxed during the 1950s.

During the 1960s, the chapel began to host more secular events, such as inviting professors and other dignitaries to speak on secular topics. According to The Stentor, a convocation series was attempted in 1977, but ended prematurely after the end of the first semester due to lack of funding and interest.

Today the chapel functions as a multipurpose space. In similar fashion to the past, a variety of speakers still pass through, including journalists, filmmakers, and authors. With the music department occupying the old Author Reid Library, the chapel offers suburb acoustics for group and solo rehearsals. Its religious purpose remains for some users: the Community Church of Lake Forest and Lake Bluff holds a weekly service in the chapel . Even though the Lily Reid Holt Memorial Chapel is no utilized for required Lake Forest College student worship, it still manages to bring together a diverse community.

Instructions for Using the Tour

Computer / Desktop Instructions:

When using a computer, you navigate with your mouse/trackpad. Using your cursor, you can click and drag to change your view to anywhere within the 360° area. Click on the arrows to move to different areas in the tour. You can also use the buttons in the menu bar at the bottom of the screen to pan in different directions, zoom, and change the various interface options. Go ahead and experiment. If something stops working, you can always reload!

As you move the cursor through the screen you will see some highlighted regions appear. Click on them to bring up informative popups. There are also a few “more info” buttons that also open popups. Just click on those buttons to open a popup. To close a popup, click inside the popup box.

Tablet or Phone Instructions:

On a tablet or phone, you navigate by moving the device (if your device supports gyroscopic feedback, which most do), or by dragging the image on the screen. Touch the arrows or highlighted areas to explore the tour. Touch the popup boxes to close them. Sometimes, depending on how you are holding your mobile device, you may not always face the same way as you progress through the tour. You can turn off the gyroscopic controls by clicking the small gyroscope image at the bottom of the screeen.

The tour works best in landscape (horizontal) mode.

On some phones you may need to lift up your phone to portrait mode, then back to landscape mode, in order to clear the menu bar at the top or bottom of the screen. 

Virtual Reality/VR/Google Cardboard Instructions:

The tours can also be experienced in full 360° using a VR headset, such as a Google cardboard. Once the tour opens, click on the viewer icon to active VR mode (see image on left). You may need to do this on a second screen (see image on right).

To navigate the tour in VR mode, point the small white crosshairs in the center of the view towards buttons or arrows.

If you are using a phone as a VR headset, it is suggested that you turn off screen lock and automatic dimming to avoid interuption of the tour.

On all devices, you can also navigate the tour using the control bar at the bottom of of the screen.

HTC Vive and Oculus Rift Virtual Reality Instructions: 

If you have access to a virtual reality headset such as the HTC Vive or Oculus Rift, this tour can be experienced through your headset via the WebVR API. With your headset and software turned on and ready, navigate in the Firefox (Mozilla) browser to the VR link for the Chapel tour, with ?vr at the end.

VR walkthrough of Lily Reid Holt Memorial Chapel of Lake Forest, optimized for computer, mobile, and handheld devices: /dcfiles/zeller/Reid-Chapel.html

VR walkthrough of Lily Reid Holt Memorial Chapel of Lake Forest, optimized for VR devices, e.g. Google Cardboard: /dcfiles/zeller/Reid-Chapel-VR.html