Church design and build

In the United States, faith-based design-build is a mature industry. In Spain and Latin America, a growing congregation still has to hire an AV integrator, a general contractor and a decorator separately — and hope they talk to each other.

Lobo Interiors treats the worship space as its own discipline: a room where assembly, preaching, music, technology and silence coexist, and where every design decision shapes how the gathering is experienced.

We design and deliver the whole project — layout, platform, acoustics, lighting, AV, furniture, accessibility and permits — with a single point of contact from start to finish.

Why no specialist exists here

US firms such as Visioneering Studios, Aspen Group or Churches by Daniels have delivered multi-million turnkey worship projects for decades. In Spain the market splits between AV integrators and generalist refurbishment contractors.

AV integrators

They solve sound, video and streaming well, but they arrive once the room is already built: ceiling, geometry and materials have already decided how it will sound.

General contractors

They build well, but they do not design the use: real capacity, entry flows, sightlines from the back row, kids' area, cry room or musician backstage.

Generalist decorators

They bring aesthetics but not reverberation control, speech intelligibility, public-assembly regulation or evacuation compliance.

Our approach

One studio that designs, specifies, coordinates trades and supervises construction. Design and delivery under one roof, like the North American design-build model.

What a complete worship project includes

Programme and capacity

Attendance per service, five-year growth forecast, number of services, and entry and exit flows between back-to-back gatherings.

Layout and platform

Assembly geometry (frontal, fan, semicircular), platform height and depth, pulpit position, baptistry, table, band and choir.

Architectural acoustics

Reverberation time by frequency band, echo and mode control, treatment of walls and ceiling, isolation from neighbouring dwellings.

Lighting and AV

House, stage and camera lighting; screens, projection, sound and streaming infrastructure designed with the room, not bolted on afterwards.

Support spaces

Welcome area, café, Sunday school rooms, cry room, pastoral offices, storage and accessible restrooms.

Permits and compliance

Public-assembly licensing, evacuation, accessibility, fire protection and municipal noise limits.

Speech and music ask for opposite things

A room optimised for live worship usually ruins preaching intelligibility, and a room perfect for the spoken word leaves the band sounding dry. Design is finding the right balance for each congregation.

Preaching

Short reverberation times (0.8–1.1 s in mid-size rooms) and control of late reflections so every word reaches the back row clearly.

Contemporary worship

A relatively dry room plus a well-designed reinforcement system: adding reverberation electronically is far easier than removing it from a live room.

Isolation

In commercial units below apartments, airborne and impact isolation is the first thing to solve: it drives both the licence and the relationship with neighbours.

Congregations and institutions

Growing evangelical churches

Congregations moving from a rented room to their own space, or needing to double capacity without changing building.

Parishes and historic churches

Respectful interventions in protected buildings: lighting, thermal comfort, accessibility and acoustic improvement without harming heritage value.

Multi-faith spaces and chapels

Quiet rooms in hospitals, campuses, care homes and hotels, where symbolic neutrality is part of the brief.

Multi-site campuses

A replicable standards manual for congregations opening several locations that need consistent brand and experience.

Indicative investment

Indicative ranges for worship rooms between 200 and 800 m² in Spain. Actual figures depend on the existing building, the isolation required and the technical level of the platform.

ItemIndicative range
Integrated design project and site supervision€18,000 – €60,000
Construction and building services€400 – €900 / m²
Acoustic treatment and isolation€60 – €180 / m²
Platform, stage lighting and AV€40,000 – €250,000
Assembly seating (per seat)€90 – €320

Figures given before a technical visit. After the first meeting we provide a tighter range for your building and schedule.

Frequently asked questions

Do you work with churches of any denomination?

Yes. We work with evangelical congregations, Catholic parishes, interfaith chapels and quiet rooms in hospital or corporate settings. The project adapts to each community's liturgy and culture.

Can you convert a retail unit into a worship space?

It is one of our most frequent briefs. We first assess planning and acoustic feasibility, and only then design. Changing the use to public assembly is the critical part.

Do you include sound and streaming systems?

Yes, as part of the integrated design. We coordinate AV integrators from the project stage so the room and the technology are designed together.

Where do you work?

Studios in Barcelona, Madrid and Málaga, with projects across Spain. For Latin America we work with remote design and supervision plus a local contractor.

A worship space is not decorated. It is designed.

Tell us who you are as a congregation, how many gather each week and what building you are considering. The first conversation is about whether the space can do what you need, and at what investment.