Church of St Mary Magdalen

Church of St Mary Magdalen

The Church of St Mary Magdalen is a medieval parish church substantially rebuilt and extended in the 20th century. The north aisle and tower represent the oldest surviving fabric, constructed in uncoursed rubble with sandstone dressings. The tower's lower two stages are sandstone ashlar, while the third stage is white limestone ashlar. The east end of the nave, vestries and west porch were added in 1960-62 using smooth, pale grey pre-cast stone. The west end and clerestory of the same period employ uncoursed sandstone rubble. The south aisle, rebuilt in the 19th century using medieval stone, is also constructed of uncoursed sandstone rubble, though the extent of original material surviving the early 1960s rebuilding is unclear. The pitched roofs are covered in slates laid in diminishing courses.

The church comprises a nave with chancel and sanctuary, north and south aisles, a west tower and spire, north and west porches, a clergy vestry adjoining the east end of the south aisle, and a choir vestry at the west end.

The north aisle elevation displays five bays defined by buttresses with offsets, including a diagonal buttress at the north-east corner. A gabled porch, added in 1876, projects from the far right with an arched doorway featuring a moulded surround and carved foliage label stops. To its left are two flat-headed three-light windows with cusped arches, followed by three pointed-arched two-light windows with cusped ogee heads. The east wall has a three-light pointed-arched window with reticulated tracery. The tower at the west end is three stages high, with a crenellated parapet topped by corner pinnacles and gargoyles, and a set-back spire with two tiers of lucarnes. The first stage has four string courses and diagonal buttresses with offsets. The first and second stages contain late 13th-century Y-tracery windows with mullions circular in section. Above a ball-flower cornice, the third stage displays a 14th-century Perpendicular two-light window with panel tracery. A trefoil niche in the east wall holds a medieval statue of Mary Magdalene, the church's patron saint. The 20th-century gabled east end projects from the north aisle, presenting a canted bay with four narrow windows on the front (the outer two mullioned) and one on each side, all with shallow triangular heads and a single high transom.

The south elevation reveals all historic phases in somewhat haphazard arrangement. An abrupt transition occurs between the pre-cast stone of the east end and the uncoursed sandstone clerestory, which has flat-headed three-light mullioned windows with blocked surrounds. Two bays of the clerestory are visible before being obscured by the rebuilt south aisle. The early 1960s clergy vestry, a single-storey flat-roofed structure in pre-cast stone, occupies the aisle's east end, featuring simple square-headed mullioned windows of two or three lights. The four-bay south aisle elevation has raised coping to the gable ends, with bays defined by buttresses with offsets (those at corners diagonal). Four windows between these buttresses display Y-tracery with mullions circular in section. At the aisle's west end, an early 1960s single-storey flat-roofed choir vestry in pre-cast stone continues around to form the canted entrance porch. This porch has a moulded cornice rising into a shallow gable over a wide-arched recessed door. In the gable head above is carved an alabaster vase surrounded by tears of penitence, the traditional emblem of Mary Magdalene. The canted porch has single-light rectangular windows in each face, set in moulded surrounds. Behind the porch rises the gabled west end of the nave, lit by a shallow-arched five-light window with slender mullions except for the two outer ones, which are thicker.

Internally, the west entrance passes through a narthex added in 2007 into a spacious four-bay nave continuous with the chancel, all built in the early 1960s. The arched roof is divided into eight bays by timber ribs resting on corbels positioned between three-light clerestory windows. The choir occupies the chancel, with the sanctuary to its east. The south side of the sanctuary contains the modern piscina and a 14th-century triple sedilia with simple moulded arches and head stops formed as human heads. The second head from the left is medieval; the others date from the 19th century. The altar stands in the canted east bay, whose window contains an elongated carved calvary. All windows except those in the north aisle have plain glass. All pews and choir stalls are modern, made of afromosia, a West African wood.

The medieval north aisle has a six-bay queen-post roof with split tie beams clasping the queen struts, wind braces, and carved bosses on the collar beam soffits. The rafters above the collar beams have cusped apexes. The structure underwent heavy restoration in the 19th century. The arcade stands on three circular piers and one octagonal pier, carrying moulded pointed arches with capitals embellished with small fleurons on all but one. At the east end on the south side is a Tudor arch from the former chancel. The north wall contains a medieval aumbry. The stained glass is predominantly Victorian, except for that in the westernmost window, added in 1920. The south aisle timber roof is a modern, plainer version of that over the north aisle. Its arcade, dating to the early 1960s, has pointed moulded arches and octagonal piers without capitals.

A plain 13th-century circular font represents the church's oldest object. The 19th-century pulpit incorporates medieval open tracery carved in oak, consisting of flowers and acorns with six tiny grotesque heads.