Architecture Payson
A landmark treated as a building
The Payson Temple, and the blossom that climbs its glass.
Announced in January 2010, dedicated in June 2015, and visible from I-15 ever since. Ten and a half acres, 96,630 square feet, a single central spire 208 feet high, and an exterior of cream precast concrete rather than the granite half the internet reports. Inside the walls, roughly twelve hundred windows of Holdman Studios art glass worked as an apple blossom that opens further on every floor. Architecture, materials and grounds, and nothing else.
Southern Utah is my home turf. Payson is not, so these pages are researched rather than lived: checked against city, county and venue sources, and dated so you can see how fresh they are. For the on-the-ground work here I lean on a Utah County partner agent.
Start here
Five years from announcement to a building you can see from the freeway.
The building on Payson's west side was announced on 25 January 2010, broken ground on 8 October 2011, opened to the public for a month between 24 April and 23 May 2015, and dedicated on 7 June 2015. The published visitor count for that month long open house is 475,542, which is more than twenty times the population of the city it stands in.
What it is, physically, is 96,630 square feet of floor area on a site of 10.63 acres at 1494 South 930 West, carrying a single attached central spire 208 feet high. The site sits at about 4,691 feet. It is the fifteenth building of its kind in Utah and the third in Utah County, and from I-15 it is the most conspicuous thing in Payson by a wide margin.
This page treats it the way it treats any other landmark on this companion: as architecture, materials, dimensions, landscaping and a car park. What the building is used for and who uses it are not this page's subject, and nothing here should be read as a description of Payson or of anybody buying a house in it.
The building in numbers
208 ft
to the top of the single central spire
96,630
square feet of floor area
10.63
acres of site, at about 4,691 feet
2015
dedicated on 7 June, after a month long open house
The exterior
About 1,615 precast panels, cut and cast to read as stone.
The single most repeated error about this building is that it is faced in granite. It is not. The cladding is architectural precast concrete in a warm cream tone, heavily articulated so that it reads as native stone and masonry from a distance, and the numbers behind it are the reason it is worth a look up close.
| The specification | The figure | Where it comes from |
|---|---|---|
| Exterior cladding | Cream precast concrete panels, highly articulated to read as stone | The building's published construction record, and trade coverage of the precast package |
| Number of panels | Roughly 1,615 individual panels | Trade coverage of the construction |
| Cladding area | About 116,876 square feet of panel | Trade coverage of the construction |
| Height | 208 feet at the single attached central spire | The published construction record |
| Floor area | 96,630 square feet | The published construction record |
| Architect | Architectural Nexus, of Salt Lake City | Trade coverage of the project team |
| General contractor | Wadman Corporation | The contractor's own project record |
| Site | 10.63 acres at 1494 South 930 West, at about 4,691 feet | The published construction record |
Dimensions and dates from the building's published construction record, checked 14 August 2026, with the panel count, the cladding area and the project team taken from trade press coverage of the construction and attributed accordingly. Interior stone was sourced internationally and is not what you are looking at from the pavement; the exterior question is a precast question.
Precast on this scale is a different craft from stone cladding and it is why the building holds its detail. Panels are cast off site in controlled conditions, which allows deep profiles, consistent colour and crisp arrises that would be slow and expensive to cut in real stone, and then they are hung. Sixteen hundred of them on one building is a serious logistics exercise before it is an aesthetic one.
It also means the correct thing to say about the material is precise rather than romantic. This is not a stone building pretending to be modern, nor a modern building pretending to be stone. It is a concrete building whose exterior was designed, from the start, to carry the visual weight that stone would have carried, at a cost and a schedule that stone would not have allowed.
The glass
An apple blossom that opens as it climbs the building.
The architectural feature people actually come back for is the art glass, and it is the work of Tom Holdman and Holdman Studios. The motif throughout is an apple blossom, drawn from the orchard ground that this end of Utah Valley used to be, and it is not applied as a repeating pattern. It progresses. Buds appear on the lowest level, open further on each floor above, and reach full bloom at the top of the building.
That is an unusual thing to attempt in glass because it means no two levels carry the same drawing, and it is the reason this building's glazing gets talked about at all outside architectural circles. The count is roughly six hundred exterior windows and six hundred interior ones, which is a very large amount of designed glass for a building of this footprint.
A claim that this building carries more art glass than any other of its type circulates widely in enthusiast coverage. It is repeated often enough to be worth mentioning and it is not something this page can stand behind as a measured fact, so it appears here as what other people say rather than as a figure. A specific square footage for the glass also circulates; no source this page could reach publishes one, so none is printed.
From the outside and after dark, the glass is what the building is. The precast holds the shape and the spire holds the skyline, but the light coming through worked glass at night is the reason people slow down on the freeway, and it is the best argument for driving over at dusk rather than at noon.
A single motif that opens a little further on every floor is a hard thing to draw and an easy thing to miss, which makes it worth looking up for.
The grounds
Four times the planting the ordinance asked for, and nowhere to go inside.
The site is 10.63 acres and most of what a visitor can actually do here is outdoors, so the landscaping is not a detail. This section is the practical part: what is planted, what encloses it, where to leave the car, and what is honestly not available.
The landscaped grounds are open to the public, and the project put in roughly four times the plant coverage that the local ordinance required, which is why the site reads as a garden rather than as a lawn with a building on it. A decorative steel fence runs along the 930 West frontage, and the whole thing sits on ground that rises just enough from the freeway side to give the building its silhouette.
Parking is straightforward and shared. The site adjoins a meetinghouse and the arrangement between them adds more than two hundred spaces, which is a great deal of parking for a building with no visitors' centre and no ticketed anything. The practical effect is that turning up to walk the grounds is easy at almost any time of day.
What is not available is an indoor visit. There is no visitors' centre and no arrival centre on this site, which is a genuine difference from several other buildings of its type in the state and is the single most common wasted journey here. A month long public open house ran between 24 April and 23 May 2015 before the building was dedicated, and that was a one time event nine years before this page was written rather than a standing arrangement.
The honest recommendation is therefore a twenty minute walk in daylight for the precast and the landscaping, or a stop at dusk for the glass. Either of those is worth the five minutes it takes to drive across town from the old grid. Neither of them is a half day.
There is nothing to go into here, and two of the most repeated facts about the building are wrong. This site has no visitors' centre and no arrival centre, so a trip here is a walk around landscaped grounds and a look at an exterior. Anyone expecting an indoor attraction will be disappointed, and that is the most common wasted drive in Payson. The two errors worth correcting before you repeat them: the exterior is cream precast concrete rather than granite, and the month long public opening in 2015 was a one time event before dedication rather than a standing arrangement. This page covers the architecture, the materials and the grounds, and it does not cover use, access or anybody's participation.
What the valley carries
The shared subjects, written once for nineteen towns.
A landmark belongs to the town it stands in. The canyon, the lake and the county's larger days out do not, and the region pages carry those instead.
The other landmark
The Nebo Loop
The byway whose front door is on the far side of this town, with the mountain at the end of it.
Read the guideDays out
Family weekends in Utah Valley
The county's paid attractions priced and dated, for the part of a visit that a grounds walk does not fill.
Read the guideThe whole valley
Utah Valley on The Local
Seven shared subjects and nineteen town companions, gathered on one page.
Open the hubWhere this sits
The west side landmark and the older town behind it.
This building stands on the newer half of Payson, looking back at a grid that is a century and a half older than it is. These three carry that older half and the move itself.
The other landmark
The Peteetneet Museum
An 1901 schoolhouse at the opposite end of town, saved from demolition and open free of charge.
Read the pageThe rest of it
The top 12, ranked
Where a grounds walk sits against a canyon road, a waterfall and three summer traditions.
Read the pageBuying here
The south end of the valley
The west side this building stands on is where the city is growing, and that is its own set of questions.
Read the pageKeep reading
More of Payson on The Local.
Things to do
The top 12, ranked
Twelve entries, each with the body that runs it, its season and what it charges.
Read the guideTwelve miles up
Payson Lakes
Three lakes at 8,000 feet, a paved lakeshore path, and one loop you can never book.
Read the guideThe hill school
The Peteetneet Museum
An 1901 schoolhouse the town nearly knocked down, now twelve rooms and no admission.
Read the guideThe first week of September
Golden Onion Days
Five days at the start of September, running since 1929, and a parade that shuts Main.
Read the guideMoving here
The south end of the valley
Two freeway exits, a city that sells its own power, and a train that is only proposed.
Read the guideThe companion
Payson, in full
The canyon road, the schoolhouse, the onion weekend, the temple grounds and the move itself.
Read the pageQuick answers
The Payson Temple, answered.
208 feet to the top of the single attached central spire. The building carries 96,630 square feet of floor area on a site of 10.63 acres at 1494 South 930 West, on ground sitting at about 4,691 feet. It is the tallest and by a wide margin the most conspicuous structure in Payson, which is why it reads as a landmark from I-15 rather than only from the streets around it.
No, and this is the most repeated error about the building. The exterior is cream precast concrete panels, highly articulated so that they read as native stone and masonry from a distance. Trade coverage of the construction puts the package at roughly 1,615 individual panels covering about 116,876 square feet. Interior stone was quarried internationally, but that is not what you are looking at from the pavement. The exterior question is a precast question.
It was announced on 25 January 2010, ground was broken on 8 October 2011, a public open house ran from 24 April to 23 May 2015 with a published attendance of 475,542, and the building was dedicated on 7 June 2015. That is a little over five years from announcement to dedication. It is the fifteenth building of its kind in Utah and the third in Utah County.
The landscaped grounds are open to the public and they are worth twenty minutes. What there is not is anywhere to go inside: this site has no visitors' centre and no arrival centre, which is a genuine difference from several comparable buildings in the state and is the most common wasted journey in Payson. Parking is shared with the meetinghouse next door and adds more than two hundred spaces, so turning up to walk is easy at almost any hour of daylight.
The architect was Architectural Nexus of Salt Lake City, and the general contractor was Wadman Corporation. Trade coverage of the project also names Reaveley Engineers and Associates on structure, Great Basin Engineering on civil work and GSL Electric on the electrical package. The art glass throughout is the work of Tom Holdman and Holdman Studios, which is the part of the design that gets discussed outside architectural circles.
An apple blossom motif by Holdman Studios, drawn from the orchard ground this end of Utah Valley used to be, and worked so that it progresses up the building rather than repeating. Buds appear at the lowest level, open further on each floor above, and reach full bloom at the top. The count is roughly six hundred exterior windows and six hundred interior ones. A claim that this building carries more art glass than any other of its type circulates in enthusiast coverage and is not something this page can stand behind as a measured fact.
10.63 acres, and the planting on them is the reason the site reads as a garden rather than a lawn. The project put in roughly four times the plant coverage that the local ordinance required, and a decorative steel fence runs the 930 West frontage. Since there is nothing to enter here, the landscaping is most of what a visitor actually experiences, alongside the exterior itself. Dusk is the better time to come, because that is when the worked glass does its job.
1494 South 930 West, on the west side of Payson toward I-15, which is about five minutes across town from the old grid. Parking is on site off 930 West and is shared with the adjoining meetinghouse, an arrangement that adds more than two hundred spaces. The building is the tallest thing on that side of town and is signposted from the surrounding streets, so it is not difficult to find from either freeway exit.
The grounds are, and there is no building on the site open to general visitors: no visitors' centre, no arrival centre and nothing ticketed. The month long public open house that ran from 24 April to 23 May 2015, before the building was dedicated, was a one time event rather than a standing arrangement, and the 475,542 attendance figure attached to it belongs to that month. This page is about the architecture, the materials and the grounds, and it does not cover use or access beyond that.
A landmark on the west side, and a town that grew toward it.
The ground this building stands on is the half of Payson that has been filling in for twenty years, between the old grid and the freeway, which is where most new construction in the city has gone. If that is the half you are looking at, the questions worth settling are about lots and services rather than about landmarks: what the plat carries, whether the secondary irrigation connection is in place, and what the city utility account covers. Tell me what you are weighing and I will put you with a Utah County partner agent who works the south end of this valley, and stay on the file for the financing side.
Referral disclosure. Outside Southern Utah, I connect home sellers and buyers with partner agents I trust in their area. If you choose to work with an agent I refer, that agent's brokerage pays my brokerage (Real Broker, LLC) a referral fee. The fee comes out of the agent's compensation; it is not an added cost to you. You are always free to choose any agent you wish, and using a referred agent is never required.