Abstract:
There is already rich scholarship that explores the diverse ways in which colonial states and architects
employed the classical style across the British Empire, paying careful attention to local and imperial influences
upon building design. Ecclesiastical architecture in Kenya is a vital source through which to understand the
particular nature of colonial entanglement in the region. As colonial architecture and urbanism played pivotal
roles in shaping the spatial and social structures of African cities during the nineteenth and twentieth
centuries. In the first earlier twentieth century, missionary activities in was at its zenith at the East African
Coast and the thus Anglican ecclesiastical architecture began to appear in the mainland dominated and inspired
mainly by Early English Gothic architecture. The Anglican Church of Kenya started mission stations in urban
areas such as Nairobi, Nakuru, Kisumu and Eldoret in English-like homes, cathedrals and parish offices. The
study reveals how the architectural and technological transfers from the West continued synchronously with
evangelism to create the prescribed image of the Anglican Church in Kenya. In the context of the
international relations, these discourses played a significant role in consolidating British imperial power, as
happened elsewhere in the British Empire. We argue that certain architectural elements have long been
recognized internationally as symbolic of state power.
