Church Heritage Record 606101

W meeting rooms and halls, aisled nave with bellcote, S porch, chancel, north vestry with other meeting rooms.

The site has low archaeological potential. There are no burials in the churchyard.

Excavations have shown that the area around Folkestone has been populated from prehistoric times and a villa survives on the East Cliff which dates from the Roman period. The Saxons and the Jutes were also present in the area in c. 635 Eanswythe, daughter of Eadbald King of Kent, founded a religious house in the locale of the Bayle. An early church bearing her name was destroyed following cliff erosion; the second was destroyed c.867 by Viking raiders. Another church built by King Athelstan was presumed to have been destroyed in 1052 by Earl Godwin on the way to his showdown with King Edward the Confessor. In 1095 Nigel de Muneville succeeded as lord of the manor and to him is attributed the basis of the modern day parish church.

In 1313 Folkestone received a Charter from King Edward II. By this time Folkestone had become a member of the confederation of Cinque Ports.

In 1843 the railway came from London and the viaduct crossing the Foord valley was built. This was followed by the purchase of the Harbour by the South Eastern railway that succeeded in transforming the ailing harbour into a successful cross-channel port. The significance of these events can be best registered when we note that by 1851 the population had nearly doubled from twenty years previously to 6,726 people. By 1881 this trend continued and the population soared to 18,986 people. This enormous rate of growth required huge new provision of places of worship and the town received several large new churches in this period.

St Saviour's began in 1880 as a mission in what was a poor part of northern Folkestone. A building in Sydney Street which had been a baker's shop was acquired and adapted as a chapel, Sunday school and cocoa tavern. In October 1880 the Sisters of the Community of St John the Baptist at Clewer, Berkshire, became involved with the project. They had first come to Folkestone in 1867 to work at St Peter's mission. Two sisters came to live at 19 Sydney Street and the following month the first service was held. Early in 1888 a building fund for a permanent church and Somers Clark (then in partnership with J T Micklethwaite) was appointed as architect. He was a good friend of the priest, Father Day, who was to be at St Saviour's for 50 years: both men were Anglo-Catholic in their churchmanship.

The site for the church, which had been a market garden, was given by Lord Radnor and groundwork for the building began in November 1889 under the contractor, William Dunk of Folkestone. There were difficulties of drainage and the foundation stone was not laid until 12 May 1891 [date from Tricker]. The original plans envisaged a large W tower but this was given up for a bellcote of 1899. It was also planned to face the walls with flint but this was dropped for reasons of expense and ragstone was used instead. A further unrealised intention was to plaster the brick interior walls and decorate them with sgraffito. Building work proceeded in stages and the church was at last consecrated on 25 July 1900. The later work on the church seems to have involved J T Micklethwaite as architect. His is the choir vestry of 1907 and the S aisle and SE porch were completed in 1913. An inscription in the SW porch says the church was commenced in 1890 and was built in memory of Mother Harriet (d 1883), the first mother superior of the Community of St John the Baptist. The total cost of the church was £12,947 (including £1,648 for the terracotta).

The bare brick internal walls were distempered under a scheme formulated in 1939. Major changes took place in the 1980s. In 1986 the dais for a forward altar was built and the previous altar, a marble slab, was sunk into the floor at the E end. The greatest change, however, was the bricking off of the W part of the church to form a multi-purpose parish centre, completed in 1988 by David Irwin of Kenneth Waite and Partners of Folkestone. The organ loft was completed in 1989. The present wooden floor was installed c. 2004.

The six bays of the nave dominate the exterior of the building, separated by red brick buttresses with four set-offs and hexagonal turrets topped with small domes. Each bay has a large Perpendicular window of three lights, each with concave headed lights with heavy cusping. The tracery is formed of small panels with ogee heads and super-transoms, under reticulated units. The windows are with two-centred arches and without labels. The nave walls have a plinth and embattled pulpit. Three bands of coloured brick run the lengths of the walls at window level. The west end of the nave is finished with a complex gable of a roughly Dutch form, six bands of coloured brick, and a window of the same form as those to the N and S.

The nave has a bellcote to the W with three bells.

The S porch is a small gabled structure. The S doorway has a two-centred arch with three orders of mouldings and a label. It is accessed by a modern ramp and flight of stairs.  There is a small statue in a niche about the door.

The chancel projects by a single bay. The W window is of the same form as the nave windows but over five lights. Above it is a small rectangular window. It has two diagonal buttresses.

The western part of the interior received a new community centre in the 1980s consisting of a number of meeting rooms, halls, WCs and a kitchen. All of these are modern and arranged over two floors, accessed by a staircase and accessible lift in the centre of the church.

The nave is aisled, with a tall arcade with two-centred arches of three orders. The piers have no capitals and run unbroken from the floor to the ceiling. There is no clerestorey and the roof is a pointed barrel vault. The nave windows are described in the preceding section.

The chancel is a single bay in width and depth, with a large five light E window, and two three light N and S windows set in arched recesses. The roof is a pointed barrel vault.