Roman Catholic Church of Our Lady and St Patrick with attached presbytery and gate piers

Roman Catholic Church of Our Lady and St Patrick with attached presbytery and gate piers

Built in 1879-80, the church was designed by Peter Paul Pugin in the 14th-century Gothic style. The presbytery was added in 1887. The complex occupies a prominent corner site parallel to the main road, with sloping ground rising towards the rear.

The church is constructed of rock-faced stone with ashlar dressings and banding, beneath a slate roof. It comprises a nave with aisles, a canted apse, a south-west stair turret with spire, and a baptistry to the north. The presbytery is connected to the church at the north-east corner by a linking staircase range.

The church exterior features a moulded stone eaves cornice, cross finials, and a coped plinth. Windows to the aisles and sanctuary have hoodmoulds and cubic stops. The canted apse displays tall paired lancets with trefoil heads on its east-facing sides, with a wide cill band; triple quatrefoils appear on the north and south sides above the aisles. The aisle gables have large circular windows with trefoil tracery. The south aisle contains four windows and the north aisle three, all of 3-lights under pointed Tudor arches with trefoils in the heads, alternating with narrow strip pilasters. The south-west bay of the nave has a blocked pointed-arch entrance. The clerestory above features paired cusped single lights to each bay. A gabled baptistry at the west end of the north aisle has banded stonework and an early perpendicular window. A single-storey gabled sacristy stands at the north-east end. The south-west corner of the nave contains an octagonal stair turret with ashlar banding and slit windows, terminating in a belfry with a short spire. The west end has a central doorway reached by three stone steps, with a moulded pointed-arch and hoodmould with stops, set within a shallow gabled porch flanked by triple slit windows. The west gables of the aisles display tall pointed-arch windows, that to the north aisle positioned between narrow buttresses. Above the entrance is a wide band and a large rose window crossed diagonally by two pairs of intersecting bars at right angles, with cinquefoils in the outer angles.

The presbytery, situated north-east of the church, is a stone structure of two storeys plus basement beneath a pitched slate roof with ridge and gable stacks. It has a coped stone plinth with raised and coped verges and water tables. The rear and side elevations show ashlar banding. The south elevation has three bays: the centre and right bays feature double-height canted bay windows with pyramidal roofs topped by metal cross finials, all lights having cusped heads. The left entrance bay contains a tall square-headed entrance reached by stone steps flanked by short coped stone walls; the opening holds double doors with moulded jambs and an overlight of triple quatrefoils. The left return is blind and features a set-back two-storey bay with an attached single lean-to providing the link to the church, lit by stepped single lancets with trefoil heads serving the stair. The right return has a small single-storey attached building; the scar of a formerly larger brick outbuilding is visible on the east gable of the presbytery, which also displays a two-light cusped-head window to the ground floor and a stone cross finial at the apex. The rear elevation has a central shoulder-arched entrance with an inset twelve-panel door, flanked by a single and a two-light mullioned window to the right and a two-light mullioned window to the left. Above is a cross window with a pair of rectangular lights with quatrefoils above, flanked by similar windows to those below.

The church interior retains its original sanctuary with a marble floor and plastered painted walls. Stained glass in the paired lancet windows depicts Our Lady and St Patrick at the centre, flanked by St Joseph, St Gregory, and St Cuthbert. An elaborate Caen stone reredos features triple pinnacled and crocketed canopies with filigree finials. The high altar, reached by three marble steps, has a frontal including a carving of St Patrick supported on slender marble shafts with foliate capitals. The side chapels each have ornately carved altars with pinnacled and crocketed canopies, fronted by sections of former Derbyshire granite communion rails pierced by two rows of quatrefoils. A large stone chancel arch with slim inner shafts terminating in naturalistic foliated capitals and matching outer shafts continued as a hoodmould rises above. A gothic stone pulpit stands immediately to the left of the chancel arch; its multi-sided form is elaborately carved with a clustered Derbyshire granite base and pierced gothic balustrade.

The four-bay nave has plain plastered painted walls and a pitch pine scissor-braced roof. A sill band to the clerestory windows incorporates corbels supporting the roof trusses. The arcades comprise circular columns with splayed heads and moulded octagonal capitals, with matching responds supporting two-centred arches with hoodmoulds. At the springing are large and long corbels, said to be shaped after those at Exeter Cathedral, each carved with different naturalistic fruit and leaf patterns. Caen stone Stations of the Cross and an ornate gothic font are present. The west gallery is reached by a staircase lit by a trefoil-headed lancet in the turret at the south-west corner of the nave; the organ, dating from 1902, has figured panels. The area beneath the gallery has been partitioned by a glazed timber screen incorporating seating and kitchen facilities. The baptistry, now converted to toilet facilities, retains its original ornate metal gates with pierced quatrefoils.

The presbytery interior retains its original plan throughout. The ground floor vestibule has a geometric tiled floor and simple cornice, opening through a round-arch into a stair hall with a right-hand corridor providing access to principal rooms and a steep wide staircase to the left leading to the sacristy and church. Original simple joinery and plasterwork are throughout, with the principal ground floor rooms featuring windows in arched recesses and retaining original chimney pieces. The original panelled dog-leg stair has double newel posts and stick balusters. The rear contains kitchen and service rooms. The first floor has mostly four-panel doors and simple plasterwork including window arches, with at least one fireplace surviving.

Gate piers of ashlar with square plan and chamfered corners stand at the entrances to both the church and presbytery. They have octagonal moulded caps with octagonal acorn finials, contributing to the special interest of the principal buildings and included in the listing.