Church Of St Andrew And St Mary

Church of St Andrew and St Mary, Peterson Road

A parish church of 1846 designed by George Gilbert Scott, one of the most successful church architects of the 19th century. The building was significantly reordered in the 1970s by Richard Shepley.

The church is built in coursed, rock-faced sandstone with freestone dressings. The nave and chancel roofs are covered with replacement thin slates, while the lean-to aisles retain their original thick graded slates.

The building follows an Early English style with an aisled nave and lower chancel. The chancel has a north vestry and 20th-century north-east extensions. The plan is characteristic of Scott's work, with a steep nave roof behind coped gables and lean-to aisles. Hood moulds with head and foliage stops are used consistently throughout the exterior. Evidence of a former gabled porch remains on the south aisle, but the main entrance is now positioned in the west front. The west front features a tall pointed arch recessing the openings, with a doorway flanked by nook shafts and two pointed windows above it. A pointed window sits in the gable beneath a gabled bellcote containing a single bell. The 5-bay nave has no clerestorey, with plain two-light aisle windows without tracery. The 3-bay chancel displays pointed windows, a triple stepped east window, and a south doorway under a shouldered lintel. The vestry stands under a gabled roof, with the organ chamber beneath a lean-to roof.

Inside, the nave arcades have round piers and double-chamfered arches. The tower arch is similar, rising on semi-circular responds. The chancel is more richly detailed, with an inner order on corbels. The nave roof comprises crossed arched braces on corbels, while the chancel has a keeled wagon roof. The walls are plastered. The chancel is separated from the main body of the church by a glazed screen across the chancel arch. The west end of the nave is also separated by a partition, designed in a style inspired by Charles Rennie Mackintosh's work, with an inserted first floor.

Many 19th-century fixtures, including the original seating, have been removed. The chancel retains an altar table and communion rail, both featuring open arcading and dating to 1846. The east window contains mid-19th-century stained glass. The 1970s alterations introduced new fittings in the Mackintosh style, including a font with a shallow silver bowl on a timber frame.

Scott was also renowned for major secular commissions including the Albert Memorial and the Midland Grand Hotel at St Pancras, both in London. St Andrew represents an early work where his preference for late 13th-century architecture is evident, applied here to a church of relatively modest scale and representing an early example of the archaeological approach to 19th-century Gothic architecture.