Church of St Thomas is a Grade II listed building in the County Durham local planning authority area, England. First listed on 5 June 1987. Church. 1 related planning application.
Church of St Thomas
- WRENN ID
- young-stone-ochre
- Grade
- II
- Local Planning Authority
- County Durham
- Constituency
- Bishop Auckland MP: Dr Sam Rushworth (Lab)
- Country
- England
- Date first listed
- 5 June 1987
- Type
- Church
- Address
- Church of St Thomas, B6299, DL15 9QS
- OS grid reference
- NZ 158 379
- Coordinates
- 54.7367, -1.75478
- Source
- Historic England listing
Description
The Church of St Thomas is a parish church built in 1879. It is constructed from snecked sandstone with ashlar dressings, topped with a Welsh slate roof featuring red ridge tiles and stone gable copings. The church comprises a nave with a south-west tower and a south aisle, with the westernmost bay serving as a porch; and a chancel with a north vestry. It is designed in the Geometric style.
The porch has a steeply-gabled design with a chamfered and moulded open 2-centred arch containing steps leading to a trefoil-headed door. Aisle windows are paired under linked drip-moulds; tall north windows are present, alongside paired 2-light west windows under a roundel, 2-light chancel windows, and a large 3-light east window set within a stepped 5-arch arcade. The tall, round tower has stair slits in the two lower stages; its octagonal belfry features four stone-louvred openings below gabled drip-moulds, topped by an octagonal stone spire with ribbed faces and a stone and iron finial. Windows have Geometric tracery, with those in the north and south having flattened 2-centred heads under 2-centred drip-moulds; the larger windows have 2-centred heads. A continuous sill string, stepped to the chancel windows, runs around the tower and buttresses, with the buttresses on the east walls of the nave and chancel being diagonal. A foundation stone dated 1875 is set into the north-east buttress. The steeply-pitched roofs are finished with flat gable copings and stone cross finials.
Inside, the walls are plastered and painted, with ashlar arcade and dressings. The nave roof is boarded and panelled in five planes, while the chancel roof is similarly panelled in four, extending to wall frieze panels. The 3-bay arcade features double-chamfered 2-centred arches on round columns with moulded capitals; the easternmost capital is continuous with the chancel sill string, which is stepped to the east window and forms a drip-mould to the large north organ arch. Foliage-stopped drip-moulds are present. A tall chancel arch, with a chamfer and roll-moulding, rests on polished grey granite shafts with crocket capitals and stone corbels. The Caen stone pulpit has a blind arcade with tracery; the panel facing west is filled with high-relief vine carving, and there are red marble shafts to the arcade. Similar materials were used to create the quatrefoil font. The reredos incorporates a wood arcade framing painted panels depicting the Lord's Prayer, Commandments, and Creed. Stained glass from the 19th and 20th centuries, including windows by Atkinson Bros. of Newcastle, is found within the south aisle windows.
Local climate
Church of St Thomas receives an average of 880 mm of rain a year. This makes it wetter than 64% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is lower than that of 88% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 48 freeze-thaw cycles a year, more than 90% of listed buildings. Of these, 29 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.
Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.
More on this building
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- No EPC on record for this property
- No sale records on file
- Related listed building consents — 1 application
- Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
- Flood risk assessment
- Radon risk assessment
- Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
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