Silver Street Chapel

335/0/10061 SILVER STREET 30-SEP-03 Silver Street Chapel

II

Non-conformist chapel. Dated 1893, with additions of 1902, and later C20 alterations and additions. By Edgar Wood, architect, of Middleton, for the Wesleyan Methodists, with additions of 1902 by T.Butterworth, architect of Dearnley. Red brick, laid to English bond, with ashlar sandstone dressings, quoins and decorative banding. Restrained Arts and Crafts style.

PLAN: Original T-shaped plan modified by additions to north and south elevations.

EXTERIOR: Front (east) elevation with wide gable rising from a sandstone plinth, with ashlar sandstone banding within the brick walling. Central entrance with ashlar quoining and semi-circular arch headed opening with drip mould. Datestone to the left of the double doorway . Ashlar plaque above arch head extends to dentilled cill band to stepped full- width window to gable apex, made up of 7 linked lancets. The gable apex is rendered, with sculptural decoration in the form of a tree rising from the arched head of the central lancet. Set in from the corners of the gable are wide sloping coursed stone buttresses which terminate above the cill band. Deep overhang to roof verges, supported on projecting ends of purlins and wall plates. Side (south) elevation with single- storeyed 4-bay addition extending almost the full length of the chapel. Projecting gable to east end with stepped 3-light stepped lancet window and sloping angle buttresses. 2-storeyed gabled crosswing to west end with 3-light stepped lancet window to upper floor above ground floor doorway. Between the gabled ranges, a 3-bay link with intermediate buttresses, each bay with 3, 3 over 3 pane windows. Lancets to west gable now blocked.

HISTORY: The Silver Street chapel is amongst Wood's earliest ecclesiastical commissions. The first, the Unitarian Chapel in Middleton was demolished in 1965. The building was built as a Wesleyan Chapel.