Church Of Saint Michael

The Church of Saint Michael is a parish church dating to 1868, designed by Henry Clutton with later alterations in 1889 by Sir Arthur Blomfield. It is constructed of coursed limestone with ashlar dressings and has clay tile roofing. The building comprises a chancel, a north gable block with a vestry, a nave, north and south aisles, a north chapel, and a south porch. The architectural style is a blend of Gothic and Tudor motifs.

The church’s windows are notable for their unique tracery, consisting of intersecting circles truncated just beyond their intersection, most set under square heads. The chancel’s east elevation features three elongated pointed single lights, with a three-light window on the north side and a similar window and two two-light windows on the south side. Internally, two south-west windows are set within a pointed two-bay blind arcade, mirrored by a similar arcade on the north side.

The two-storied north gable block has a lower room with a plain three-light window and an upper room featuring a large rose window with a cross formed from two mullions and transoms and trefoils. An integral chimney stack rises from the gable apex with linked polygonal shafts. The single-storied vestry block in the northeast angle has a pointed arched door and a three-light window.

The nave has five-bay round-arched arcades on slender columns to both sides. The west end features two long pointed single lights flanking a substantial five-stage buttress, which supports a partially projecting circular bell-turret with single lights and a small stone spire pierced by rectangular slits. The north and south aisles each have two four-light windows.

The north chapel projects from the east end of the north aisle, with two three-light windows. Slender columns and corbels support a moulded timber posts, lintel, and curved braces, creating a two-bay arcade onto the north aisle. The south porch, at the west end of the south aisle, is tall and gabled, featuring a pointed archway surmounted by a single light.

Internally, the chancel has a barrel-vaulted roof, while the nave and aisles have an open timber roof with substantial, simply moulded timbers. The chancel includes a piscina and sedilia with cusped pointed arches. Stained glass from 1890 is present in the chancel’s east window and the north chapel’s northeast window. The north chapel has a timber screen with heavy cusping and slender colonnettes.