Church Of St Martin

Church of St Martin, Grimsby

A church of 1938 designed by Lawrence and William Bond, with sculpture by Alfred Southwick. The building is constructed of reinforced concrete with red brick cladding in English bond, pebbled concrete dressings, and finer concrete to window frames. The roofs are flat concrete.

The plan consists of a 7-bay arcaded nave with north and south porches and a low tower at the south-east angle, a 2-bay chancel with a 2-bay south chapel, and a north vestry with service rooms attached.

The exterior of the nave aisles features five tall narrow 3-light windows on each side. The tall open south porch has a pair of concrete piers carrying a projecting flat roof and a stepped-in brick surround to a recessed 2-fold panelled door beneath a projecting concrete lintel which carries a composite stone statue of St Martin holding a sword. The door has octagonal panels and door handles modelled as sword handles. The north porch is smaller, with a stepped-in surround to a recessed 2-fold panelled door beneath a projecting lintel. Both porches have slit windows to their sides.

The nave has small 3-light clerestory windows and a tripartite west window with narrow lights beneath a continuous lintel. The square-section tower is single-stage, with narrow louvred belfry openings with pointed cusped concrete hoods and a flat roof carrying a cross-section steeple with a brick base and a narrow concrete needle spire carrying a cross-finial.

The chancel has pairs of 3-light windows to the north and south, and a 3-light east window with a lintel carrying a crucifixion sculpture mounted against a recessed panel which rises into a short turret breaking the roof-line. The crucifixion figures are flanked by roundels bearing Alpha and Omega signs on a blue-tiled background.

The south chapel has an entrance with projecting brick jambs and a projecting flat hood, a recessed 2-fold panelled door with sword-style handles, and a pair of 3-light windows. The vestry has plain 3-light leaded windows. Projecting concrete lintels and sills with stepped profiles occur throughout. Nave and chancel windows have square lights in moulded concrete surrounds.

The interior has nave arcades with square-section piers and responds and square-headed openings with a continuous stepped frieze. The chancel has a rood screen formed by a pair of narrow concrete columns and a plain lintel carrying painted sculptured rood figures. The nave and aisle ceilings have concrete beams and painted panels. The chancel ceiling has a series of polychrome reliefs: interlaced scrollwork for the north and south sides, and a pair of central panels with wave motifs, a cross and a crowned monogram "M". The windows have splayed reveals. The floor has plain tiles to the central and side aisles and parquet flooring to the seating areas. The chancel has a foundation plaque dated 8 November 1936, an aumbry with oak doors bearing an incised lattice pattern, a piscina with a concrete bowl, and an altar with a stone mensa-slab carried on concrete legs.

The stained glass east window is by LC Evetts. The south chapel has a wide opening into the chancel and a narrower one into the nave beneath stepped lintels, a piscina and panelled ceiling similar to the nave.

The font has a stepped concrete base, a boldly fluted shaft and a cylindrical tub bearing an incised wave design. It is topped with a carved and painted wooden font cover with a slender column carrying a dove on a ball.

Oak furnishings occur throughout. The altar rails and stalls in the chancel and nave have painted relief chevron motifs. There is a polygonal wooden pulpit and a brass eagle lectern with an octagonal column bearing a similar chevron motif. Electric lights in the nave and south chapel hang from moulded crosses on the ceiling and have wooden boxed lamp shades with ribbed and scalloped edges.

The church is notable for its Modern Movement design and materials, and for the integration of its architecture, sculpture, furnishings and fittings. The use of the wave and chevron motif, a reference to the sea and to St Martin's role as patron saint of seamen, is extended throughout the contemporary Modern Movement altar furnishings and the building.