Roman Catholic Church of St Mary, presbytery, wall and gate piers

Roman Catholic Church of St Mary, Presbytery, Wall and Gate Piers

This Roman Catholic church and presbytery were designed by AWN Pugin in 1838–39. The church underwent alterations and additions by PP Pugin in 1879 and by H Sandy in 1912–13, followed by a major reordering in 1998–99.

The church and presbytery are constructed of red brick with sandstone dressings beneath plain tiled roofs with stone coping. The narthex is built of cut and squared sandstone. The window tracery is broadly Decorated in style throughout.

The church is roughly rectangular in plan and built on a sloping site. It comprises a nave, chancel, aisles, Lady Chapel, organ chamber, sacristy and narthex. The L-shaped presbytery is attached to the east side.

The single-storey narthex, built in freestyle Gothic, extends across the west front and is divided into three bays by pilasters. The central bay contains a three-light window below a gable, in which sits a niche with a statue of Our Lady at the apex. The outer bays have two smaller windows each, all with trefoil heads in square-arched surrounds. The left return has three such windows, and the right return features a doorway with a two-centred arch. The gable end of the nave displays a rose window with an oculus above, topped by a gabled stone bellcote. The aisles end in oculi. The south aisle comprises five bays separated by buttresses, with a plinth, stringcourse and parapet. Each bay contains a two-centred arched window, except the Lady Chapel which has two windows. The chancel east window has three plain stepped lancets, said to be from Pugin's original church and reset when the building was extended in 1879; beneath it is a roundel bearing arms and the date 1879. The sacristy to the right is single-storey with a basement and a canted corner, containing windows of three lights to both floors. The organ chamber (formerly the Lady Chapel) has a large quatrefoil window to its east end.

The presbytery is of two storeys and an attic, constructed in brick with stone and vitrified blue brick dressings under a steeply pitched roof with a tall stack, stone coping and kneelers. The north elevation facing the road is gabled with a two-storey canted bay. Each floor has a stone mullioned window in Arts and Crafts style and a brick parapet; the gable apex contains an oculus which formed part of Pugin's original design. To the right, where the building connects to the church, is a two-centred arched entrance with hoodmould, labels and a wooden door with decorative strap hinges. To the far left is a two-storey flat-roofed addition of 1912–13, which includes a first-floor window with a heavy round-arched surround topped by a carved trefoil; this matches a window shown on Pugin's plans and appears to have been repositioned from the bay windows when they were added. The rear elevation has a modern glazed lean-to, a first-floor three-light window and an oculus to the main house gable. The rear range has an inserted uPVC ground-floor window and a two-light window with stone surround above, with a single-storey lean-to against the south wall.

Inside the church, the narthex is divided from the main body by a screen of three unequal arches with doors and glazing of late 20th-century date. The nave has an arcade of four bays carried on octagonal piers with a clerestory window above each arch. The roof is scissor-braced with gilding. The pulpit, dating from 1901, is of Caen stone and marble with carved figures. The tall chancel arch is supported by moulded capitals, short stone shafts and fluted corbels. A painted Crucifixion hangs in the arch, of unknown origin but possibly by Pugin. Three stone sedilia with detached shafts and cusped-moulded heads stand on the south side, probably originals repositioned by Peter Paul Pugin. The altar features inset quatrefoils and vesicas with mouldings and decoration; this is the original altar although the reredos is probably later. The chancel roof is boarded and gilded; the aisle roofs are scissor-braced. The north-east organ chamber is concealed from the aisle by a modern screen and divided from the chancel by two tiers of semi-circular arches supported by cylindrical piers with polygonal caps. At the west end of the north aisle stands a quatrefoil-shaped stone font on compound piers with delicate foliate carving and a timber cover. The Lady Chapel on the south-east is separated from the aisle by a 20th-century low timber rail and from the chancel by a stone arcaded screen with marble columns and traceried side openings decorated with naturalistic stiff-leaf carving. The Lady Chapel altar is surmounted by a scalloped arch, which originally served as Pugin's Easter sepulchre, its mouldings matching those of the sedilia. The arch is filled with an early 20th-century mosaic of the Annunciation, said to be by Italian craftsmen. The reredos is flanked by stone corbels supporting figures of angels bearing candles, probably from Pugin's original rood. Stained glass includes several early 20th-century windows by Paul Woodroffe; an east window by Mayer of Munich dating to circa 1887; a rose window said to date from 1839 by William Wailes, though not typical of his work; and Lady Chapel windows of 1988 by Hardman Studios, alongside an earlier 1940 window in the north aisle by the same studio. The presbytery interior was not inspected in 2015.

The gate piers on the west side of the church date from 1912–13. They are of cut and squared sandstone with stone plinths and gabled stone tops with fleur-de-lys profile to the ridge. Each pier bears a carved rosette to its upper part. To the front of the presbytery is a low brick boundary wall with stone capping and metal railings, with pedestrian gates at either end.