Dale Church (Luster)


Dale Church is a parish church in Luster Municipality in Vestland county, Norway. It is located in the village of Luster on the western shore of the Lustrafjorden. It is the church for the Dale parish which is part of the Sogn prosti in the Diocese of Bjørgvin. The red and white, stone church was built in a long church design around the year 1240 using designs by an unknown architect. The church seats about 200 people.

History

The earliest existing historical records of the church date back to the year 1306, but it was likely built about 60 years earlier. Dale Church in Luster reflects both Romanesque and Gothic styles. The medieval-era church was dedicated to Saint Nicholas. The church is endowed with soapstone sculptures and preserved interiors from the Middle Ages. Construction includes granite in cavity walls with soapstone corners and frames. The nave and choir are rectangular. The porch and the ridge turret above the entrance in the west were built in the 1600s. The Gothic west portal dates to 1250. Werner Olsen added a tower in 1635; that tower has not been preserved, and the current tower was added later. The church was restored in 1903 under the direction of architect Jens Zetlitz Monrad Kielland.
Furnishings for Dale Church are from various eras. The baptismal font from the 1200s is of soapstone and is shaped as a four-leaf clover. The pulpit is in Renaissance style from the 1600s, while the baroque altarpiece and memory boards are from around 1700. The pulpit has pictures of evangelists in the side panels together with depictions of the Crucifixion with Mary and John the Evangelist at foot of the cross, flanked by Moses and John the Baptist. The choir wall is decorated with frescoes from the late 1500s. The bride bench dates from the 1100s and the crucifix from the 1200s.

Media gallery