Church of St John the Baptist

Church of St John the Baptist, Fladbury

This parish church combines medieval fabric from the 12th century onwards with significant 18th and 19th century alterations. The tower base dates from the 12th century, while the main body of the church—the aisled nave, chancel and porch—was constructed around 1340 in the 14th century. The nave and tower were heightened in the 18th century. The church underwent major restoration in 1864 and 1871 by Frederick Preedy, the Worcester architect and stained-glass artist, who also designed several windows for the building.

The church is constructed mainly of local grey lias rubble and roughly squared blocks with buff limestone dressings. The roofs are slate except for the leaded aisle roofs.

The four-stage tower has a 12th-century lower stage with freestone pilaster buttresses and round-headed windows. On the east side is the round head of a former upper-stage opening beneath the creasing of an earlier steeper roof. Above the first stage, the tower dates from 1752 and was designed by Thomas Woodward, assisted by his nephew Richard. It features narrow windows to the second and third stages. The third stage has a clock in a stone surround on the west face. The upper stage contains two-light bell openings with Y-tracery and louvres. The parapet has Gothic panelled battlements with pierced merlons and pinnacles.

The nave has a clerestory of four two-light straight-headed windows, above which the nave was heightened in brick. The aisle windows are taller but similar in design to the clerestory windows. The aisles have similar three-light windows at their west and east ends. A 13th-century cross slab head is attached to the south aisle wall.

The porch front dates from the 18th or 19th century and features a double-chamfered round-headed arch, a segmental parapet with an iron lamp holder surmounted by a sundial. The side walls are 14th-century, as interior details reveal. The porch is rib-vaulted on slender shafts and contains a south doorway with continuous moulding.

The chancel has a five-light Decorated east window below a quatrefoil window in the gable. The north and south sides each have two-light Decorated windows. On the north side is a cusped piscina from a former sacristy and a later lean-to vestry. On the south side are a priest's door and a lean-to organ chamber.

The interior contains 14th-century four-bay arcades in the nave with octagonal piers and double-chamfered arches. Above them is an 18th-century canted plaster ceiling with longitudinal ribs, two roses, and a cornice with triglyphs. The aisles have plain cambered plaster ceilings. In the south aisle is a blocked doorway of a former stair leading to a chamber over the porch, where dressings of a former upper-chamber window remain beneath the ceiling. The outline of a former piscina is visible in the south aisle, with an adjacent aumbry. The tower arch has a continuous double chamfer and was added when the tower was heightened in the 13th century. Inner tower walls also contain tall arches that were added to strengthen the walls when the tower was raised.

The chancel arch is double-chamfered with the inner order on corbels. Similar arches open to the organ chamber from the chancel and south aisle. The chancel has a four-bay arch-braced roof, mainly 19th-century but constructed on medieval brackets bearing shield-bearing angels, with openwork tracery above the braces. A double piscina features cusped arches and corbelled basins next to a window seat. Chancel walls are plastered while other walls expose stripped stonework. There are 19th-century tile floors except for raised wooden floors below the pews.

The tower screen was erected in 1953 using panels from the west gallery that was dismantled in 1871. It records benefactions from 1716 to 1845 and notes the rebuilding of the tower in 1752.

The polychrome chancel reredos dates from around 1865 and was designed by Frederick Preedy. It is constructed of Cornish alabaster and tiles by Richard Boulton of Cheltenham, incorporating angels with harps, a cross and inscription band.

Most furnishings are 19th-century: a Perpendicular-style font of around 1850, a polygonal Painswick-stone pulpit of 1871 richly ornamented with a figure of John the Baptist, benches of 1871 with moulded ends and arm rests, and choir stalls dated 1913 with frontals of 1914 featuring a foliage cornice.

Beneath the tower is a chest monument and brasses to John Throckmorton (died 1445) and his wife. The tomb is decorated with quatrefoils and has brass effigies 4 feet long. In the chancel floor are small brasses commemorating priests Thomas Mordon (died 1458) and William Plewne (died 1504). In the nave floor is a brass to Edward Peytoo (died 1488).

Numerous wall monuments are present, chief among which is the large Baroque standing monument to Bishop William Lloyd (died 1717) by James Withenbury. It has Corinthian pilasters and scrolled sides, an entablature with achievement, and is surmounted by a portrait bust. Other wall monuments from the 18th and 19th centuries include a memorial to Elizabeth Charlett (died 1746) with portrait bust by John Ricketts junior, and one to George Perrott (died 1806). Two funeral hatchments are in the north aisle, to George Perrott (died 1806) and George Wigley Perrott (died 1831).

A notable 14th-century heraldic glass is in a chancel north window, thought to have been brought from Evesham Abbey. It represents six shields with a seventh in the trefoil above. A fragment of 14th-century glass showing the Virgin and Child is placed in an oak-framed light box at the east end of the south aisle. Other glass is mainly by Frederick Preedy and includes a good east window depicting the Passion and Resurrection around 1868, a north aisle east window of the Ascension around 1856, and other aisle windows from the 1870s and 1880s showing the Nativity and Transfiguration in the aisle west windows.

The lower stage of the tower is 12th-century but was heightened in the 13th century, when the original structure was strengthened by internal arches. The church was enlarged considerably around 1340, from which period the nave, aisles and porch date. The porch was originally two storeys. Clerestory windows suggest the nave was heightened in the 16th century and again in the later 18th century, when the nave and aisle roofs were replaced. These late 18th-century works perhaps date from around 1782 when a west gallery was installed. The tower was rebuilt and heightened in 1752 by Thomas Woodward, assisted by his nephew Richard. Frederick Preedy (1820–98), an architect and stained-glass artist of Worcester whose family moved to Fladbury in 1840, restored the chancel in 1864–65 and made several stained-glass windows for family memorial windows. The remainder of the church was restored by Preedy in 1871, when an organ chamber was added.