Church Heritage Record 637196

The now busy, densely populated commuter town of Sutton, on the outskirts of South London was a very different place in 1876.  To meet the rapid growth in population away from the town centre and the parish church of St Nicholas, the people living to the south felt the need for a nearer church.  So, in 1876, a temporary iron structure was licensed for public worship next to Brighton Road. 

The Iron Church proved so popular that after six years it had to be lengthened to accommodate the increasing population.  With such a thriving congregation there was clearly a need for a permanent church and after ten years in a temporary building, a site, mostly glebeland, was chosen.  In 1886 construction began amongst lavender fields to the east of Brighton Road, in what would become Christchurch Park.

Christ Church was ready for dedication at a ceremony on May 19th 1888 – in which year Christ Church became a parish in its own right.

The church is designed after the Gothic style of the early part of the thirteenth century and built to accommodate 1000 worshippers.  The building consists of a nave 92 feet long, 30 feet wide and 48 feet in height from the floor to the semi-circular barrel-vaulted ceiling.  The north and south aisles are of the same length as the nave and15 feet in width.  The chancel with apsidal east end is 40 feet long and 28 feet wide and ceiled at a height of 40 feet.  On the norths ide of the chancel is a clergy vestry 20 feet by 14 feet, choir vestry 19 feet by 18 feet, organ chamber, furnace room, lavatories etc. 

foundation stones at the west and east ends, a sundial over the south door, various carvings around the three doorways of the porch.  Over the Baptistry is a lovely statue of Christ the Shepherd King carrying back a lost sheep to the fold.

The highly carved Chancel Screen was given in memory of Mrs Forster and completely spans the chancel.  It contains intricate carvings of angels, grapes and thistles. It is surmounted by an ornately carved cross which towers into the vaulted chancel ceiling.  As it was being created the black and white stone chancel floor was also donated

By 1920 the screen was completed along with a set of carved choir stalls (now at the end of the North Aisle) – beautifully decorated with carved plants, animals and birds.  Above the choir stalls carved wall panels were illustrated with the twelve constellations of the signs of zodiac.  (These had no astrological significance at this time, often chancels would be symbolically decorated with sky and star motifs pointing to heaven.) Here in the chancel was the symbolic image of the created world in the choir stalls meeting the heavens in the panelling, just as symbolically it was the meeting place of people in the nave with the presence of the ‘holy of holies’ in the sanctuary.  All this carving, in a somewhat ‘high church’ tradition was by a young designer, Douglas Round

Just behind the Chancel screen on each side can be found the panels containing the Ten Commandments, the Lord’s Prayer and the Apostles’ Creed

With the East End and Chancel now beautifully furnished, attention was turned to complete the West End of the church.  In the winter of 1911-1912 the Narthex, Baptistry and huge Porch (intended to be the foot of the tower) were dedicated

The Narthex and Baptistry have a much more domestic scale about them compared to the rest of the church and are designed more in the style of the Arts and Craft Movement.  The details of this can be seen in the door handles and hinges, the shape of the windows, the tile-work above the doors and inlaid in the floor and the wall panels in the Baptistry.

In 1923 the North Aisle and South Aisle carved screens and organ case were completed, once again a gift of Ralph Forster. This completed the church to the form very much as we see it today.

The magnificent stained glass windows were gradually erected as memorials by the members of the congregation.  All but the final three windows in the South Aisle come from the studios of Edward Frampton of Buckingham Palace Road.  They were strongly influenced by both Pre-Raphaelite and early primitive Italian painting.

In the North Aisle a set of eight windows illustrates the life of Jesus Christ, from the annunciation through to the Ascension.  (The Annunciation window is dedicated to two members of the Frampton Family who died in childbirth.)

The apsidal window in the end of the Chancel contains five panels of stained glass.  These are not so easy to see from the Nave because of the wooden chancel screen.  The three centre panels, installed by John Gardener Roland, Churchwarden in 1889, illustrate various aspects of Christ – “I am the Good Shepherd”; ‘He is our Peace’ and “Behold I stand at the door and knock”.  The two outer windows were given by Mrs Frank Smith, at Christmas 1891, to the memory of her husband.  These two bear images of Christ and symbols representing Communion – “I am the Bread of Life” and “I am the True Vine”.

The two delicate windows in the side chapel show images of singers, very much reflecting the early primitive Italian style.

During 1898 a series of five stained glass windows were placed in the south aisle of the church to the memory of various members of the Mead family.  (Frank Mead was the church organist for many of the earlier years of Christ Church.)  They represent ‘Christ blessing the little children’; the ‘Parable of the Talents’; the ‘Good Samaritan’; the ‘Sower’ and the ‘raising of Jairus’s daughter’.  After these, a pair of windows, designed by George Kruger Gray (who also designed much of the British coinage of the first half of the 20th Century), was  installed in 1925 in memory of Lieutenant Henderson of the Green Howards (whose parents were members of Christ Church) and who was killed in the Irish troubles of 1922.  These windows, based on the soldier saints St George and St Martin of Tours, are full of patriotic and military motifs (St George’s Chapel Windsor, the Military Cross, the Star and Garter, the dragon, the Green Howards cap badge etc.). 

The final window on the south side is dedicated to a church member who originated from Somerset.  Designed by Alice Moore it illustrates the Somerset legends of Joseph of Arimathea and the Holy Grail. This legend and its Arthurian attachments had a resurgence in artistic and literary works of this time particularly express through the Arts and Craft Movement’s later days.  This window, which includes Sir Lancelot at the top, reflects this different style.

The largest and unmissable window is the splendid west window depicting Christ the King enthroned in heaven, surrounded by angels and the twenty-four elders, as in the book of Revelation.  Around the outside are portraits of the prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah of the Old Testament and Peter and Paul, leaders of the early church of the New Testament.  Along the bottom are the Gospel writers, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, with the apostle Andrew in the middle of them. The Scottish connection (St Andrew) is because the window is the gift of William and Mary Sutherland (Mary was a part of the Mead family) and was dedicated on St Andrew’s Day 1902.

The current instrument is an electronic church organ

Further adjustments have been made to the Church over the years to accommodate changing forms and styles of worship.  The large red-carpeted platform was installed in 1977

The Chancel and Chapel were re-ordered in 1984.   The building has more recently been enhanced with versatile lighting and sound systems.