When Utah Tile & Roofing won the bid for the new Conference Center of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, it was the largest roofing contract the firm had had since its founding in 1948. The 4-acre roof also was one of the company’s most complex jobs. Plans called for trees, watercourses and an alpine meadow, as well as public access to the roof. A tornado in mid-construction didn’t help matters either.
For decades, one of the challenges the church had was limited seating for General Conference attendees every April and October in the Tabernacle. Built in 1867, the Tabernacle, home of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and located just west of the Salt Lake Temple, held 6,000. Church leaders needed not only a larger building, but also one with more technical capacity, including the ability to immediately translate proceedings into a host of different languages for television and radio broadcasting to its more than 11 million members worldwide.