St. Joseph Catholic Church in Joliet was one of three applicants for the city’s 2026 Annual Historic Preservation Awards Program due to its recently installed exterior lights.

Sharon Merwin is the Joliet Historic Preservation commissioner who nominated the church, located at 416 N. Chicago St., for the award.

In her nomination, she said the parishioners are “diligent in maintaining the historical integrity” of the building.

“The lighting certainly highlights the building in the evening and at night, commanding a very noticeable presence in downtown Joliet, Merwin wrote.

Rev. John Hornicak, pastor at St. Joseph Catholic Church, said more than 100 accent lights now go all the way around the outside of the church.

“I grew up in Joliet,” Hornicak said. “Actually, I would occasionally attend Mass here, sometimes at seven in the morning and sometimes at seven at night. And I always thought it was a little dark.”

Hornicak said he’d looked at other area churches for ideas on exterior lighting and was impressed with the lighting at Saints Peter and Paul Catholic Church in Naperville.

“And I thought that’d be beautiful for the church,” Hornicak said. “And with the 135th anniversary coming up [on May 12], I thought that would be a nice present for the parish.”

Hornicak said his predecessor, Rev. Tim Andres, actually considered installing exterior lighting 10 years ago.

Dave Sloan, president of Accents Lighting in Joliet, whose company installed the lights, said Andes had even reached out to him a decade ago to discuss the feasibility, Sloan said.

“But the technology wasn’t there to do it like we did it,” Hornicak said. “LED lighting made the difference.”

Sloan said the system runs on 12 volts, which allows the wires to be hidden.

The lighting project cost $100,000, funded by free will donations from the parishioners, Hornicak said.

“And people were very generous,” he said, adding that parishioners embraced the project and are “rightfully proud of it.”

Sloan said century-old churches like St. Joseph weren’t designed for lighting. He loves the challenge of illuminating them and discovering their nuanced history – such as the Electrolux vacuum cleaner – from around 1939 to 1951 – in one of the towers at St. Joseph Church.

“It still had the original price tag: $69.95,” Sloan said.

St. Joseph’s exterior lighting also highlights architectural details – especially on the twin steeples – one never noticed until the lights came on,” Hornicak said.

“Now we’re seeing it – pardon the pun – in a different light,” he said.

Sloan said his skills are completely self-taught. He was selling lawn sprinklers in the 1990s when supply houses began carrying new lighting products, and he just developed “a passion for it,” he said.

He began Accents Lighting in 1998 and marketed his business by offering free demonstrations and going door-to-door. The Yellow Pages had no category for low-voltage lighting, and YouTube didn’t exist, he said.

Even today, Sloan doesn’t use stock photos to promote his products, he said.

“I’m eager to do my own jobs and showcase them,” Sloan said.

The St. Joseph lights installation began on Ash Wednesday and took approximately six weeks to complete, Hornicak said.

The Accents Lighting employees respectfully worked around the church’s schedule, including funerals, he said.

The lights turn on automatically around dusk and shut off at midnight, “although we can adjust the time,” Hornicak said

The lights are practical, too – and not just for Sunday evening Mass and special services such as Holy Thursday or Easter vigil.

“When you come down Chicago Street going southbound, it was just dark right there,” Hornicak said. “So it [the church] also lights up the area around it so people feel safe.”

The St. Joseph project is personally special to Sloan.

“I’ve worked on a lot of different projects,” Sloan said. “But just from an architectural standpoint, this one was – for lack of a better word – our Mona Lisa. It was nice that it happens to be my neighbor.”

Hornicak might agree with that.

“It’s as beautiful as it looks,” Hornicak said. “You really have to see it with your own eyes. “It’s breathtaking.”

The other two applicants for Joliet’s 2026 Annual Historic Preservation Awards Program included a home at 408 Whitney Avenue and the former Joliet Jewish Federation temple at 226 E. Clinton St. – now the Boys & Girls Club of Joliet.

The house on Whitney underwent major homeowner-authorized repair and restoration after major fire damage. The former temple had its decorative brick repaired and preserved.

Brian Bessler, chair of the Joliet Historic Preservation Commission, said the commission recommends all three applicants receive awards.

“The commission appreciates the incredible efforts by all three of this year’s applications and recommended approval of the applications go to council,” Bessler said.