Church Of St Mary

The Church of St Mary is a parish church dating from 1895 to 1897, designed by Micklethwaite & Somers Clarke for John Gretton of Bass, Ratcliff & Gretton, Brewers. It is constructed of sandstone ashlar, with tiled roofs to the nave and chancel, and copper to the aisles. The church is built in a powerful and poised Decorated style.

The church comprises a tower, nave, chancel, north and south aisles (both with porches), and a vestry to the transept. The substantial tower rises at the crossing and is screened at its base by the south aisle and vestry. It has approximately four stages, angle buttresses of four stages, and a deep parapet to its pyramidal roof. The bell chamber openings are heavily rebated and pointed, with two openings on each face, a quatrefoil panel to the central stage, and a quatrefoil-traceried 4-light window to the south at clerestory level.

The nave is tall, with a deep clerestory, crenellated parapet, and four pointed 2-light windows. Bold towers with deeply chamfered (almost octagonal) forms flank the west end, and a pointed 5-light window with elaborate geometric tracery is located at the west end. The chancel continues the nave details for one bay and is framed at the east by diagonal buttresses, with a 5-light pointed East window.

The south aisle has a low-pitched, parapetted roof and diagonal, 3-stage buttresses to the pointed, deeply rebated entrance arch. The windows are Tudor-arched, trefoil-headed and 3-light with curvilinear tracery. The north aisle is similar to the south, except where it meets the tower, where a gabled, 2-storey vestry appears as a full-scale transept, with an octagonal tower against the east gable.

Inside, the nave has pointed-arch arcades on octagonal columns, and pointed chancel tower arches. An exposed beamed ceiling is present in the nave, while the chancel has a boarded barrel vault. A substantial stone screen separates the chancel from the aisles, continued in a similar style to both aisles. Wrought iron gates with brass fleurons and a blind arcade are also located in the north aisle. A piscina and sedilia feature five pointed bays. A small, octagonal, oak pulpit stands on a stone stand. The font has a bowl of Purbeck marble with a figured octagonal form, an ornate moulded stand, and an octagonal spire cover. The East window was designed by Sir William Richmond.