Wesleyan Methodist Chapel

SJ 84 NE 613-1/4/37

STOKE ON TRENT ETRURIA Etruria Old Road (south-east side) Wesleyan Methodist Chapel

13/05/86

II Formerly known as: Etruria Wedgwood Chapel ETRURIA OLD ROAD Hanley. Wesleyan Methodist Chapel. Dated 1820. Lined-out stucco with stuccoed dressings in contrasting colour. Slate roof. Pedimented facade, with date and inscription, "Wesleyan Chapel" in a cartouche in the pediment. Central doorway with shouldered architrave beneath segmentally arched pediment carried on console brackets and flanked by sash windows with margin lights in moulded architraves. Central upper window in stressed architrave carried on console brackets. Angle quoins and heavy moulding to pediment. Sash windows in side elevations.

INTERIOR has galleries on all sides with panelled balustrades. Gallery at front with canted angles to link with side galleries. Front and side galleries supported on slender cast-iron columns with moulded caps and contain original early C19 box pews. Late C19 timber podium pulpit with span arcade balustrade set against wall supporting rear gallery. Plaster ceiling with moulded cornice and central moulded vented roundel. Open roof above rear gallery and organ. Wall tablet commemorating James Mainwaring (d.1891) with three glazed ceramic panels containing central bas-relief portrait and side inscriptions set in a white glazed ceramic frame of Ionic pilasters on moulded base and cornice with segmental pediment over enclosing inscription, side urns.

HISTORY: the chapel was built in 1820 by Jesse Shirley replacing an earlier Methodist chapel of 1808 located in a field south of Etruria. The chapel was extended and refitted in the late C19. A separate Sunday school located to the rear of the chapel and built in 1864 is now in separate ownership and is not listed.

This is a good survival of a Methodist chapel, with a well-mannered façade and an intact interior. The building also obviously has historical interest within the context of Etruria.

Listing NGR: SJ8677647089