Church Of All Saints

Church of All Saints

This is a church built between 1911 and 1913 by architect W. H. Wood, commissioned by patron Charles Thellusson of Brodsworth Hall. The building is constructed in red brick laid in English bond with some ashlar sandstone dressings and tiled roofs. It is oriented north-west to south-east, following ritual orientation practice. The plan comprises a 4-bay aisled nave with an entrance beneath a tower at the north-west corner, and a 2-bay chancel with a north chapel, south organ chamber, and vestry.

The church is designed in Romanesque style, characterised by round-arched openings with pelleted hoodmoulds throughout. The tower is substantial, with 4 lower stages and 2 upper stages, topped by a spire. It has a chamfered brick plinth with bands, clasping buttresses (the south-west one incorporating a stair turret), and a north doorway with shafts leading to a round arch over double doors with a keyed lintel. A string course sits beneath the second stage. The upper stages are set back, with 2-light louvred belfry openings in hooded recesses. Above the embattled parapet rises an octagonal 2-stage turret with diagonal buttresses and clocks beneath pointed 2-light louvred openings on the cardinal faces, with the recessed needle spire rising behind the turret parapet.

The nave has a brick plinth and buttresses between bays. Its north side features a door and window to the easternmost bay and 2 windows to other bays with a lean-to roof; groups of 3 clerestorey windows light each bay; a gable with apex crosses tops the end. The south side is similar, with a doorway to the first bay. The west end has 2 windows in a projection beneath a 3-light window with shafts and a circular gable window above.

The chancel is lower in height. A separately roofed north chapel projects from the north side with an east buttress and 3 north windows, a circular ashlar window to the east. The chancel's east end, set forward, has clasping buttresses and a foundation stone dated 1911 below a window of 3 stepped lights divided by shafts with roundels beneath a round arch. A south organ chamber with a hipped roof adjoins, with a lower flat-roofed vestry to its east; the chancel above has a lateral stack on the left of 2 windows and an east gable with a cross.

Interior

The arcades feature octagonal and cylindrical piers with 3-order round arches in brick, all with continuous pelleted hoodmoulds. The chancel arch has shafts in the jambs; a large round arch opens into the organ chamber, with 2 smaller arches into the north chapel on a cylindrical pier with a carved capital. The church contains no pews. A traceried roof screen with a crucifixion forms a notable fitting. A plaque on the south-west pier of the nave records Charles Thellusson's gift of the church to the parish upon its consecration in 1913.

Historical Context

The church forms a focal point of the Woodlands colliery village, laid out and designed by Percy B. Houfton of Chesterfield for the Brodsworth Colliery Company during 1907 and 1908. Houfton had previously designed colliery estates at Creswell and Bolsover in Derbyshire. Following the sinking of Brodsworth Colliery in 1907, he was commissioned to lay out housing along the enlightened lines of the newly emerging Garden Cities movement. Houfton applied the Arts and Crafts style to the estate houses, which drew inspiration from C. F. A. Voysey, who in 1904 and 1905 had designed colliery housing at Whitwood near Castleford, Leeds.

Woodlands was built in two phases. The first phase took place around a parkland site, with an irregular low-density plan that retained mature trees; although most of its housing has since undergone alteration, this phase retains the greatest appeal. Rapid expansion of the colliery necessitated a second, much larger phase, which proceeded with greater haste (to Houfton's own dissatisfaction) and resulted in a scheme of greater density arranged around a horseshoe crescent with central and radiating avenues. Several blocks of little-altered housing survive to illustrate the nature of the original scheme. Primary and Secondary schools and the Health Centre are the most notable public buildings erected on the estate. The estate received critical acclaim at the time, and its importance has been outlined more recently by Martin Gaskell in his 1979 study of model industrial villages.