Church Of St Mary

Church of St Mary

Parish church built circa 1328-31 for Thomas of Evesham, restored 1866-68 by William Butterfield and extended in 1899. The building is constructed of coursed limestone rubble faced with limestone ashlar, with a stone-tiled roof laid in diminishing courses and featuring an east gable-end parapet with gabled finial. The plan comprises a west tower with continuous five-bay nave and chancel, north porch and south vestry. The architectural style is Decorated.

The west tower is octagonal and rises through four stages with strings and chamfered plinth. The lowest stage has a long slit window in the south face and a similar louvred slit window in the west face. The second stage contains a rectangular light in the north face, and the third stage has another rectangular light in the south-west face. The belfry stage has four louvred rectangular bell-chamber openings, one in each main face. An ashlar spire rises directly from a hollowed cornice and is decorated with a roll moulding at each angle and a weathervane.

The nave and chancel share a continuous chamfered plinth, chamfered eaves cornice and hood-mould. Diagonal buttresses with offsets are positioned at the corners and at bay divisions. Both side elevations contain four 2-light windows; the three easternmost are tall and narrow, while the westernmost is wider with round-headed lights surmounted by a large round-lobed trefoil. The east window contains five lights.

The north porch is gabled with a gable-end parapet topped by a pointed head and end buttresses. It features a pointed doorway of two chamfered orders with a hoodmould and returns that continue as a stepped moulded eaves cornice at the sides. The side elevations of the porch have 2-light chamfered mullioned windows with square heads. The south doorway is pointed, of single order and similarly detailed with a hoodmould returning to form a moulded eaves cornice to the interior walls. A stoup is set into the west side wall of the porch.

The north vestry, dated 1899, adjoins the second bay from the west end. It has a gable-end parapet with a cross finial, chamfered plinth and eaves cornice, and diagonal south end buttresses with offsets. The south gable end displays a 3-light window with a hoodmould, and the gable apex contains a chamfered datestone inscribed "1899". A narrow doorway with hoodmould appears in the west side, and three cusped lancets beneath a single hoodmould occupy the east side, with steps leading down to a basement door below the windows. A tall ashlar chimney stack rises in the east angle with the chancel.

The interior walls are plastered beneath a 19th-century wagon roof. The ornate painted and gilded reredos is recorded as 14th-century but much restored. It comprises three recessed semi-hexagonal bays with vaulted canopies, cusped crocketted and finialed ogee arches, flanking pinnacled buttresses and taller outer buttresses set in the east window jambs. Large stone corbels intended to support small statues stand either side of the reredos. The piscina features an ogee-arched vaulted canopy similar to the reredos, while the two sedilia are more simply detailed and 19th-century in date. A 19th-century traceried arcaded chancel screen reaches to wall-plate level and is surmounted by a trefoil frieze. In the south wall of the nave is a piscina that probably once resembled that in the chancel. The circular font and carved timber pulpit are 19th-century.

Memorials include an early 18th-century example to John Parsons, died 1713, on the north wall of the nave, featuring a segmental pediment and panelled pilasters. Two oval memorials of the late 18th and early 19th centuries and a mid-19th-century memorial appear on the west wall.

The east window contains glass dating to circa 1878 by Mrs Barber, the vicar's wife. A fragment of medieval glass is preserved in the north chancel window.

The church underwent very heavy restoration in 1866-68 by William Butterfield at the expense of Mary Barber in memory of her late husband, the Reverend Barber.