University Of Sheffield Drama Studio And Attached Walls And Railings

Baptist Church and attached Sunday school, meeting rooms, steps, wall and railing, now Drama Studio, located at Glossop Road, Sheffield. Built 1869-71, with Sunday school added 1886, designed by CJ Innocent. The building was converted and remodelled internally around 1980.

The structure is constructed of coursed squared stone with ashlar dressings and slate roofs, the main roof patterned with lighter coloured slate. It is designed in the Gothic Revival style.

The plan comprises a chancel, vestries, nave, aisles, and a south-west tower with spire, together with a north-west porch.

The exterior displays a chamfered plinth, string course, buttresses, shouldered coped gables, and crested ridge tiles. The windows in the main body of the church are blocked. The chancel east end contains a 4-light pointed arch window with Geometrical tracery in a moulded surround. To its right stands a shouldered side wall stack. On either side is a 2-storey vestry; that to the north has 5 shouldered plain sashes, below which is a 20th-century doorway and to its right 4 plain sashes.

The nave west end features a 5-light pointed arch window with Geometrical tracery and moulded surround, with a small graduated triple lancet above. Below is a double doorway with cusped openings and central shaft, with flanking shafts topped with pinnacles, all under a crocketed gable with a round window. On each side are small single lancets.

The aisles have 5 gables, each with a 3-light pointed arch window, and below, 2 small single lancets. Some on the north side have been replaced by 20th-century doors. At the north-east end stands a large corner stack with diamond-shaped flue, and a side wall stack. At the north-west end is a shouldered stack with a round flue.

The unbuttressed south-west tower comprises 3 stages with string courses and a band with fleurons below the bell stage. The first stage has to the west a flat-headed door with hoodmould, and above it, 2 narrow lancets. The south side has a small lean-to projection and above it, 2 short buttresses. The second stage has a small louvred lancet opening on 3 sides. The bell stage has rebated corners with double impost bands and moulded heads topped with round spires. On each side is a heavily moulded 2-light pointed arch bell opening under a crocketed gable. The octagonal spire has a single tier of gabled lucarnes set very high.

The canted north-west porch has a flat-headed doorway to the north, with a pointed arched tympanum. To its right is a shouldered lancet. Above are 3 small square openings with cusped heads.

Outside, at the west end, is a coped retaining wall with plinth, coping and patterned cast-iron railing, with steps and gateway to the right, and a cast-iron lamp at the left end.

The adjoining Sunday school forms a cross range at the east end. It has a facing gable with a 4-light pointed arch window, flanked by single shouldered doorways with cusped overlights. To its left is a 2-storey range with a lower hipped projection at the right end, and 2 gable stacks. The first floor displays 5 plain sashes arranged in the pattern 1:1:2:1. Below is a paired sash flanked to the left by a single sash, then a smaller sash. To the right is a door with overlight, then a single sash. Beyond is a further 2-storey range with a half-hipped roof and a hipped ridge dormer. The recessed first floor has tall round-headed windows arranged 1:3:1. Below is a door with round-headed overlight, flanked to the right by 2 round-headed windows.

The interior of the main body has a traceried wooden gallery on 3 sides, supported on cast-iron piers, octagonal below and round above. The roof is a hammer beam construction with traceried openings. The east end features an arch with round stone piers with rings, flanked by small side arches, each with a round opening above it.

CJ Innocent (1839-1901) is particularly noted for his numerous early Sheffield Board Schools designed 1873-76 in conjunction with T Brown.