, at the site of the medieval church destroyed by the earthquake. A wealthy citizen of Yerevan, Melik Aghamal, took over the expenditure of the construction of the church.
Like Churches of St. Pogos Petros, St. Zoravor and St. Katoghike of late Middle Ages, St. Hovhannes-Mkrtich is of the type of three-nave basilica with a prayer room, the main altar and the two sacristies on the east side.
In 1979, architect Rafael Israelyan drew the attention of Catholicos Vazgen I to the fundamental draft of the reconstruction of the church. In 1980s, Rafael Israelyan’s son, architect Areg Israelyan, continued his father’s work, and the church underwent a total renovation.
A dome was built, the exterior walls were covered with tufa. Extensive work had been done to restore the interior. On the western side was built gallery for the choir and the main altar was decorated with bas-reliefs. The construction of the bell tower was fully completed.
There is an educational-cultural center “Kozerni” in the church, where are taught modern and ancient Armenian (Grabar), foreign languages (English, French, German), history of Armenia and the Armenian Apostolic Church, are introduced to modern computer programs and are trained to work on personal computers.
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