Christ Church

CHESTER CITY (EM)

SJ4066 SOMERSET STREET 1932-1/6/264 Christ Church

GV II

Anglican church. 1866 to 1900. By John Douglas. Orange Ruabon brick and sandstone; grey-green slate roofs. Largely free Early English with some Decorated and Perpendicular-style features. PLAN: aisled nave, chancel, baptistry, chapel and vestries; the intended south-west steeple was not built. EXTERIOR: nave of stone-dressed brick on high flush plinth of squared snecked rubble; flush quoins. Geometrical west window of paired lights flanking broader central light. South-west porch has rectangular west window; oak double doors with lancet above; south aisle has 3 bays with paired lancets and a stone bay with single lancet and porch for priest's door; rainwater pipe and head dated 1897; pinnacled buttresses; oak door, arched. The clerestory has a cantilevered timber-framed hip-roofed bellcote over main porch; 6 pairs of lancets and a single lancet. Apsidal chapel south of chancel has 2 small lancets in west gable; rainwater head dated 1897; two traceried 2-light rectangular windows south; east end with 3-light window in C15 manner. Chancel of stone has a lancet in corner, south; east window of 3 lancets in recessed arch; dripmould on corbel heads. Organ chamber and vestries adjoin north face of chancel; diminishing stone chimney with circular flue on chancel wall; timber-framed shingle dormer on north roof-pitch. North vestry has 2 lancets; north chimney. A further vestry, roof parallel with chancel roof; triple lancets, east; 3 north windows of paired shouldered lights; oak door and triple lancets in west gable-end. North aisle of nave has small door in east bay; 3 pairs of lancets; clerestory has 9 pairs of lancets. Baptistry off west bay has roof stepped down over north apse; a rectangular 3-light panel-tracery north window; a 1-light window in each oblique face; a pair of lancets and a single lancet in west face, adjoining west end of nave. All gables have stone copings with crosses as apex-finials. The nave roof has 5 lucarnes on each slope, now blocked. INTERIOR: the 5-bay nave has chamfered arcade with no capitals; corbelled shafts carry queen post trusses with cusped braces; wood-block floor; boarded ceiling; well-detailed aisle roofs. Apsidal baptistry with font directly opposite south porch. Chancel arch with shafts on

angel corbels; wagon roof to chancel, lower than nave; encaustic tile floor. Pedestal pulpit; rood-beam, rather lightweight, 1920 by Sir Charles Nicholson; reredos and chancel fittings c1900-1910, also by Nicholson; chapel reredos by Kempe 1897 and gates probably by Nicholson; organ and case with panels painted in Pre-Raphaelite manner. Chapel windows 1897, south aisle 1901 and west window 1902 are by Kempe; baptistry 1906 by AK Nicholson; west north aisle window 1906 by Bryams.

Listing NGR: SJ4074167019