Church Of St Columba

The Church of St Columba is a parish church dating from 1888 to 1890, designed by C Hodgson Fowler. It is constructed of brick with red sandstone dressings and has a graduated Lakeland slate roof. The church comprises an aisled nave and chancel, an eastern apse, a north-east organ chamber and vestry, and a south porch, with west porches and a baptistry. It is built in the basilica style.

The exterior features a plinth extending to the full height of the east apse and a lower apse to the south chancel aisle; semi-conical roofs are present. The eight-bay nave and chancel have shallow buttresses continuous with a Lombard frieze, with the north and south elevations featuring shallow pillars defining bays. The aisles have single lights under drip moulds, and the clerestory has paired lights under a drip string that continues around the west angles and over a large west roundel. Round-headed windows have sloping sills and recessed plain surrounds. The west porches are gabled and contain three windows flanking boarded doors under moulded lintels, with a single window beside each door in the central section; a conical-roofed baptistry apse is blank.

The interior showcases full-length arcades with plain round arches on round piers with cushion capitals. The roof is supported by queen-post trusses on horizontal corbels. A complete scheme of decoration by James Eadie Reid includes a painted sanctuary apse depicting groups of early English saints, biblical scenes above a high panelled dado along both aisles, and stained glass in many windows, some signed and dated JER 1905. The marble Communion rail is panelled in cream, green, and red, and the sanctuary floor incorporates a marble mosaic including Frosterley marble. A square dark marble font with Romanesque carved patterns is located in the west baptistry.