[1][2] The church was designed by Victor Schulte, a Prussian immigrant from Westphalia.

[5] Schulte also designed Milwaukee's St. John Cathedral (built 1847-53) and the 1850 Holy Trinity Catholic Church in the same style.

A painting of the Annunciation behind the altar by Franz Xavier Glink was donated by King Ludwig I of Bavaria.

The east end was extended and the west facade was reworked, with a new spire added in 1866.

[6] The interior was redecorated after a fire in 1893, but the exterior still stands very much as it did right after the 1867 remodeling, two years after the Civil War.