Emmanuel Church

Emmanuel Church, Wylde Green

Emmanuel Church stands on Birmingham Road in Wylde Green. Built between 1909 and 1926, it was designed by the Birmingham architect William Henry Bidlake. The nave and aisles were constructed before 1914, with the chancel completed by 1926. Planned crossing tower and transepts were never executed. A Lady chapel and parish halls were added in 1967.

The building is constructed of red brick with limestone dressings and tiled roofs.

The plan comprises a five-bay nave with clerestory, north and south aisles, and a shallow baptistery at the west end. The chancel is apsidal, with vestries to the south-east and a Lady chapel to the north-east.

Exterior

The most striking feature is the polygonal apse facing the road, with gabled bays divided by buttresses that terminate in stone pinnacles with crocketed finials. The tall four-light windows have Geometric tracery and hoodmoulds decorated with ballflower ornament, giving the apse a distinctly French character. A tall bellcote rises from a buttress against the south side of the chancel.

The five-bay nave has tall three-light windows with continuous brick hoodmoulds. Lean-to aisles below the nave windows are supported by buttresses with stone gables, and contain two-light square-headed windows. At the west end of the south aisle stands a canted turret for the gallery stairs, with hipped roof and a deep band of blue brick lozenges under the eaves.

The west gable has a large five-light traceried window flanked by buttresses of lozenge section. A shallow projection across the lower west front contains the baptistery, with a central two-light window flanked by doorways.

The 1967 Lady Chapel is rendered with a steep north-facing gable containing three asymmetrically placed slit windows. The associated parish rooms, also of 1967, are of red brick but without contextual design quality. A weatherboarded clerestory sits on flat roofs facing the road, partly obscuring the lower north side of the church.

Interior

The interior is impressively tall. The chancel arch is of moulded stone set on canted brick responds. The choir has a stone lierne vault with contrasting ribs and carved bosses. A further arch with detached stone shafts separates it from the sanctuary, which has a radial vault.

The nave arcades have triangular brick piers supporting stone arches that frame the windows, with subsidiary round arches opening into the aisles below the window sills. The surrounding walls are rendered and white-painted.

The nave is covered by a very fine timber roof, with two roof bays to each arcade bay. It is a variant on a hammerbeam design: arched braces descend to short hammerbeams, with the braces terminating in carved pendants. Further arch-braces spring from the ends of the hammerbeams, parallel with the line of the wall. Two tiers of windbraces are present.

The west end has an organ gallery on a canted arcade of three bays, with piers of quatrefoil section. The baptistery occupies the central bay under a brick vault with stone ribs. Wood block floors are laid beneath the seating, while the chancel and passageways have quarry-tiled floors.

Principal Fixtures

The font is a fine piece with a curved tapering octagonal bowl of golden marble on a central stem, surrounded by four green marble shafts. A polygonal oak pulpit of 1936 has linenfold panels below pierced tracery, with matching backboard and tester in one piece.

The English altar dates from 1927 and features a carved, coloured and gilded timber reredos of triptych form. Plain oak stalls have shallow panels, each with an ogee-quatrefoil motif, and brass music rests. Nave seating comprises oak chairs of early 20th-century date.

The Willis organ dates from 1932 and has a Gothic case with an attractive swept gabled centre, designed by Stephen Bicknell. A plain oak rood beam of early 20th-century date carries carved and painted rood figures.

History

William Henry Bidlake (1861-1938) was born in Wolverhampton, the son of an architect. He studied at the Royal Academy Schools in London and under Bodley & Garner. He established independent practice in 1887 and taught architecture at Birmingham School of Art from 1893 onwards. He designed numerous Arts and Crafts houses in the middle-class suburbs of Birmingham, as well as several Gothic churches. St Agatha, Sparkbrook, is acknowledged as his masterpiece.