Church Of St Mary

SJ 4162 ECCLESTON C.P. CHURCH ROAD (North side)

7/105 Church of St Mary

1/6/1967

I

Church, 1899, by G F Bodley, at expense of 1st Duke of Westminster. Coursed red sandstone; pitched leaded roof to nave and chancel. West tower; continuous nave and chancel with aisles; south porch; north vestry. Exterior has severe rectilinear massing, little adorned, with windows placed high in walls. Flat-roofed buttressed aisles and vestry with solid parapets; pierced parapet and carved enrichment on porch. Flying buttresses to clerestory at alternate bays. Tower with paired bell openings with quatrefoils, stringcourses, buttresses and frieze to crenellated parapet. Complex Decorated east window; reticulated tracery elsewhere. Interior: Rib-vaulted throughout; baptistry in tower; 6 bay open arcade on quatrefoiled octagon piers with shafts to vault joined by moulded string at head of arcade. Glazing and furniture complete: glass by Burlison and Grylls; reredoses (Farmer and Brindley); tomb to 1st Duke (Bodley, Chavalliaud, Farmer and Brindley); chancel and chapel screens; organ case; font with tall cover; south door of oak with good wrought ironwork. Of C14-C15 inspiration, the church is a complete example of Bodley's mature style; it anticipates features of Liverpool Cathedral. Cf. St Mary, Newbold Astbury; the late C15 disposition of nave, chancel and aisles and the treatment of their arcades are similar.

Listing NGR: SJ4129262634