Christ Church

Christ Church is a church located in Sowerby Bridge, built in 1819 by John Oates. The chancel was rebuilt between 1873 and 1874, and the roof was replaced in 1894. The church is constructed of ashlar, with a roof that is not visible.

The building features a west tower with north and south additions, a galleried nave, and a chancel containing a north organ chamber. It is designed in the Perpendicular style. The tower has three stages and displays offset diagonal buttresses. The west face has a flat-headed three-light window with a two-light window above the first stage, a single-light window to the second stage, and a clock in the base of the three-light window on the third stage. Windows are pointed-arched, with hoodmoulds and some featuring headstops. Slit vents are present to the right on all stages, and the tower is topped with an embattled parapet and pinnacles. The north and south faces above the two-storey additions mirror the west face, with the southern addition also embattled, and featuring a pointed-arch doorway and cusped tracery to the windows.

The nave has six tall bays with a plinth and offset buttresses with pinnacles. A pointed-arch doorway, set within a roll-moulded surround that projects forward and is flanked by pinnacled columns and shields in the spandrels, is accessed by a flight of steps. A three-light window is positioned above the doorway. All windows are pointed-arched, three-light, transomed, and set within hoodmoulds with grotesque headstops.

The chancel consists of two bays, is narrower, and features chamfered plinths, offset buttresses, and steps leading down to a basement doorway on the left. The windows here are as the nave, but of two cusped lights. The embattled parapet includes a buttress rising into thick, crocketed pinnacles and a gable cross. The east front has three plain pointed-arch windows, while the north front (chancel) is simpler.

Inside, the church has a horseshoe gallery with a panelled front supported by cast-iron columns with quatrefoil sections. A tall, blind, pointed tower arch is present, with a basket-arched ground-floor opening and a pointed-arched gallery opening. The nave’s hammer-beam roof, dating from 1894, has cusped-headed sections supported by columns matching those of the gallery that rise from octagonal shafts. A plain pointed arch leads to the chancel, which contains a tessellated floor, an elaborate Gothic-style stone reredos, and a wooden chancel screen from 1935. A polychromatic marble war memorial was erected in 1921. The pews are of pitch pine with book drawers. An octagonal font from 1895 has panels decorated with symbols of the apostles and is supported by a central shaft with colonnettes on a square base. A small table, dated 1520 and originating from Brig Chapel (which this church replaced), has turned legs.