Church Of St Mary

The Church of St Mary is a church dating to 1866-7, designed by F Preedy. It incorporates some materials from an earlier church built in 1852 by Edward Welby Pugin. Constructed of snecked sandstone rubble with bands of red ashlar, it has a tile roof. The church comprises a nave, a north-west tower with a spire, a south porch, a lower chancel, and a north transept.

The three-stage tower features bell openings with two trefoiled ogee lights under a pointed head, and a stone-faced clock in the middle stage. The west doorway is moulded and pointed, set within a gabled surround. The ribbed stone spire is set back behind an embattled parapet and includes two-light lucarnes. The west window of the nave has three trefoiled ogee lights with Geometric tracery under a pointed head. The north wall of the nave has two bays with windows of two and three trefoiled lights under pointed heads, the former incorporating flowing tracery. The north window of the transept features two trefoiled lights under a pointed head with a quatrefoil. The chancel north window has a single trefoiled light with a trefoil below the pointed head. The south wall of the nave also has two bays with windows of two and three trefoiled lights with Geometric tracery. The south chancel wall contains two windows of two trefoiled lights with flowing tracery, and the east window consists of three cusped lights with Geometric tracery. The porch has a coped gable with a cross finial and a pointed doorway moulded in two orders, incorporating angle shafts with carved foliage. The inner doorway is also moulded and pointed, with foliated caps to the angle shafts.

Inside, the nave roof trusses are constructed of pine and rise from carved corbels, featuring short king-posts and raking struts above collars, supported by short straight braces to the principals and larger curved inner braces. The pointed chancel arch is moulded in two orders, with corbelled responds on the inner order and angle shafts with foliated caps on the outer. Wall painting surrounds the arch, added in 1894. An oak rood screen is intricately carved with tracery. The chancel windows have marble inner shafts, and the east wall is decorated with stencilled and painted designs. The chancel roof, repurposed from Pugin's earlier church, has arch-braced collar trusses with curved wind-braces. Part of the reredos also originated from the earlier church. A memorial by Countess Gleichen is located against the west wall of the nave, dedicated to the Hon Edward Hugh Lygon and the Hon Richard Fitzroy Somerset, who died in South Africa in 1900 and 1899 respectively. The memorial is a bronze frieze of figures in relief, set between mosaic bands, portraying canopied figures of Obedience, Fortitude, and Loyalty.