Church Of St John The Evangelist

The Church of St John the Evangelist is a church built in the 1893 to 1895 by J.M. Bottomley, with construction by the Allison Brothers. It is located on South Bank, Middlesbrough. The church is primarily built of brick with red sandstone dressings to the interior, and originally had Welsh slate roofs, now covered with bitumen. Stone gable copings are present.

The church is designed in the Early English style and comprises a continuous clerestoried nave and chancel with aisles, a half-octagonal apse, a south organ chamber, and a west porch. The gabled porch has boarded double doors within a pointed surround of three chamfered orders under a hoodmould, with a circular plate-traceried window above. The west end has three levels of windows, topped by a circular window now used as a ventilator. The clerestory has nine windows in the nave and two in the chancel. The nave has five bays with offset buttresses between them. There is a three-bay north chancel aisle, a pent roof to the organ chamber, and a five-window apse with a half-pyramidal roof. All windows have double-chamfered surrounds with hoodmoulds. The roofs have shaped rafter ends; a finial is missing.

Inside, the windows have triple-chamfered surrounds with hoodmoulds. The five-bay nave arcades are under a continuous hoodmould, with short round columns, roughly-dressed capitals, and moulded bases. The chancel arch has two plain orders and nook shafts. Similar arcades are present to the sanctuary and organ chamber. The interior features embattled wood wall plates and barrel roofs. The sanctuary has a patterned polychrome encaustic tiled floor and wood panelling below the window sills, with paintings of saints and coats-of-arms. A large painting of the Ascension is located behind the altar. A panelled section, with enriched mouldings and a door architrave, dating from 1936 and created by Thompson (Kilburn), is on the north wall of the chancel. An octagonal pulpit, dating from circa 1916, includes carved panelling, applied Ionic Order with an inscribed frieze, a short stair with turned balusters, and a panelled newel. A matching low chancel screen is also present. The 1904 organ, originally by Abbot and Smith (Leeds) and recently rebuilt, has a good pine-panelled case with cusped panels. A carved wood rood, dating from circa 1920, is suspended from the chancel arch. A mid-20th century church hall adjoining the east end is not considered to be of special interest.