Church Of St Margaret

The Church of St Margaret is a Grade II* listed church built between 1853 and 1855 by architect W. Hayley, with an extension added to the west by W. Tapper from 1923 to 1925. It is constructed of rock-faced stone and ashlar, topped with a slate roof. The church features a nave, aisles, a south porch, transepts, a crossing tower, a sanctuary with a vestry, and a side chapel. Notably, the nave extends two bays further west than the aisles as part of an incomplete scheme from 1923.

The four-bay aisles have a projecting plinth, weathered buttresses, a sill band, an eaves parapet, and three-light windows in the style of the 14th century. The porch, located in the second bay, includes diagonal buttresses. The clerestory features two-light windows, while the transepts are supported by angled buttresses with gablets and crocketed pinnacles (the south side lacks pinnacles) and have three-light, two-tier windows. The three-bay chancel includes two-light clerestory windows, angle buttresses with crocketed pinnacles, and a prominent seven-light, two-tier rectilinear window.

The two-stage central tower, which had a steeple until 1927, is adorned with angle buttresses with offsets and gablets, a clock face, and two-light belfry openings on each face, each with arched ogee dripmoulds and castellations.

Inside, the church features a free Perpendicular nave arcade with an ornate hammerbeam roof, decorated with carved musicians at the springing of the arches. The chancel includes sedilia, a piscina, and a massive free-standing late 19th-century alabaster reredos, behind which an earlier reredos is still present. The ceiling is elaborately canted and panelled in Gothic style. The tall crossing arches and various fittings, including carved screens, an organ chamber, a pulpit, and stained glass, contribute to the church's impressive character as a notable example of the Gothic Revival just before the High Victorian Gothic period.