Webisode 10 - The Villa

The Villa de Chantal was a convent in Rock Island. It was built between the years 1900 thru 1929. Through those years it was built in three sections. The first housed the convent, the second contained the chapel and additional housing spaces, and the third was the boarding school.

I stumbled across The Villa while working on a final project for a Photojournalism Class at the University of Iowa. My instructor's advice was to change focus to this historic building because it was more interesting than my previous idea and would fit better to the time restrictions I had for the remainder of the semester. I took his advice and spent 5 weeks driving between Iowa City and Davenport twice a week to take pictures of this building.

A few months after shooting this project The Villa burned down. These were some of the last images taken of it and for posterity's sake I have since taken follow-up pictures of it to contrast the before and after. I was in all intents and purposes hoping to come back to The Villa and share it more accurately with the striking colors some of the stained glass it held and take more black and white pictures of it. Unfortunately, it will have to be remembered like this and in my mind. I will miss it, even if I was only visiting it for such a brief amount of time.


The Video





The Images