Church Heritage Record 603280

4-bay aisled nave with transepts and west baptistery, north-west porch, 2-bay chancel flanked by south vestry/Lady chapel (previously organ chamber) and north children’s chapel.  Crypt under the chancel.

Nave approximately 20m (62ft) by 10m (34ft).

Built in 1890 to designs by R K Freeman.  Unchanged since apart from subdivision of the baptistery with screens in 1979 to provide a choir vestry and other rooms. At this time too the organ was removed.

The building is in a loose late Gothic style (one used to say “debased”) with odd window tracery, probably intended to suggest the 16th/17th centuries.  It is long and low, with no vertical emphasis and little flair except that provided by the west front, which is quite elaborately articulated.  The dominant features here are circular bell turrets at the external corners of the aisles.  These are particularly prominent as the flatly pitched roofs of the aisles are hidden behind  coped parapets on all sides.  There are finial crosses to all gables and turrets.

The square west face of the south aisle has a square headed two-light, with a transom and idiosyncratic intersecting tracery above. There is a small round-headed doorway tucked away next to it.  There are three string courses which zigzag up and around these features.  There is a small porch attached to the west end of the north aisle, with flanking buttresses crowned with gablets framing the pointed doorway, which has continuous mouldings.

The motif of the square façade is repeated in the west face of the nave, where pinnacled angle buttresses crowned by gablets rise above eaves height, hiding the lower part of the nave roof gable, which only protrudes above a string course at this height.  There are twin cusped openings in the gable itself.

Within this square frame, the wall is pierced by three pointed windows with identical late Perpendicular tracery, a large three-light flanked by two slightly smaller two-lights.  A baptistery projects below these, again with a flat square front with coped parapet, and four stumpy buttresses defining its three bays, each of which are lit by a small lancet.

The narrow clearstorey is hardly visible from street level, hidden behind the parapets described above.  The windows are square-headed two-lights, with plain arched heads.  The nave bays are demarcated externally by buttresses of two weatherings, with a three-light in each bay, each with a pointed head and differing tracery, but all similar in style to that in the west facade.  A string-course runs along under the lintels.

Moving round to the east side, the east window of the only slightly lower chancel is a large five-light with spiky tracery, again framed by buttresses with three steep weatherings to eaves height, and a central buttress which terminates at the window cill.  The transepts have large four-light windows in their outer walls, with again a transom and tracery in a loose late Perpendicular style. The south transept and south chapel form a double gable, the organ chamber (as was) lit only by a narrow lancet high in the wall.   The north chapel has a pointed two-light with stained glass in the east wall, and a square-headed three-light with stained glass in the north wall. 

Moving to the interior, the west doors and porch are not now used for access, and the baptistery is subdivided by screens and now used as storage space. There is oak panelling around the walls at the west end.  From here the aisle arcades are carried east by square piers, which continue into the pointed arches.  These have continuous mouldings from the springing point.  This pattern is observed in the transept and chancel side arches.  The chancel arch has two orders of continuous moulding springing from castellated capitals, which die into pyramid consoles. 

There is a string course demarcating the clearstorey.  Strip pilasters continue up from the piers to support the corbels for the roof, which has an arch-braced  moulded collar and king posts. The aisles are quite wide, and like the nave are filled with ranks of bench pews, giving the church a large capacity.  The nave and aisles are painted white, with red carpets, while the chancel is a lurid red, also with red carpets.

A flight of three stone steps leads to the chancel through the original communion rails (see below), and a further step up to the sanctuary, which is paved with patterned encaustic tiles, in contrast to the stone flags and timber boarding elsewhere in the church. The High altar is raised a further three steps higher on a concrete podium. There is pitch pine panelling around the sanctuary walls, and a mosaic reredos behind the altar (see below).  The side arches give access to the children’s (scholars) chapel and the Lady chapel (previously the organ chamber). The transepts and chancel have boarded barrel ceilings.