Christ Church Methodist Church

Christ Church Methodist Church is a Methodist church built between 1903 and 1904 by Brewell and Bailey, with internal alterations carried out around 1980. It is constructed in an Art Nouveau Gothic style using tooled ashlar, with a moulded plinth to the tower and a plain plinth elsewhere. The roof is of graduated slate, featuring overhanging eaves and moulded stone copings to the gables. The church has an aisled nave, an almost free-standing tower to the south-east corner, gabled transept bays, and a chancel.

The four-stage tower has tapering stepped buttresses up to eaves level and continuous chamfered bands between each stage. The east elevation of the tower features a canted, full-height staircase turret with narrow slit windows. The south elevation has a pointed, central doorcase with a moulded segmental head that dies into deeply chamfered, plain jambs, and double studded wooden doors. To the west side is a recessed and chamfered two-light mullion window. The second stage is blank except for slit windows to the west and north sides; clock faces are set within bracketed carved surrounds at the top of the third stage, one on each side. The fourth stage has two-light pointed bell openings with hoodmoulds over and cusped, ogee-headed lights, a coved eaves stringcourse, and embattled parapets, with an embattled staircase turret to the east.

The gabled south elevation of the nave has two recessed and chamfered two-light mullion windows to the base of a large five-light pointed window with reticulated tracery and major mullions to each side. A tall buttress is to the west of the window, followed by a gabled two-storey vestry set at an angle to the rest of the building, fronted by a low embattled wall with a pointed doorcase similar to that in the tower. Above the vestry is a recessed and chamfered three-light mullion window; to its west, on the ground floor, is a mullioned bay window.

The west elevation of the nave has a low aisle featuring short, tapering buttresses flanking three three-light recessed and chamfered mullion windows. Above are three pointed windows with reticulated tracery and hoodmoulds. To the north is a gabled transept bay with a similar five-light window flanked by tapering buttresses. Attached to the chancel to the north is a low addition with mullioned windows. The east elevation is similar to the west and north, but obscured by other buildings.

Internally, there were extensive alterations around 1980. Surviving features from the original interior include the chamfered arches through to the passage-like aisles, the larger arches into the transept bays, the original cusped, panelled pulpit, and the plain nave pews. The waggon roof is now obscured by a lowered tile ceiling, and the original gallery to the south end is now fitted with a glazed screen. The organ has been dismantled and rearranged, and the north end has been completely remodelled.