Church Of St Laurence

Church of St. Laurence, Foxton

This parish church on the south-east side of High Street is a Grade I listed building of considerable architectural importance, combining fabric from the late 12th or early 13th century with significant later additions spanning the 14th and 15th centuries.

The church comprises a late 12th or early 13th-century chancel and nave in a continuous range, extended with north and south nave arcades and aisles dating to the early 14th century. A clerestory, one bay of the south arcade, and the west tower were added around 1475. The building was substantially restored between 1876 and 1886.

Externally, the church is built of fieldstone and flint with limestone dressings. The west tower, constructed in the late 15th century, is three stages high, standing on a plinth with three-stage diagonal buttressing. It is embattled and features a cut-down spire with a central gargoyle to the main cornice. The restored west window contains three cinquefoil lights in a four-centred head. The bell stage has two paired openings, each with a cinquefoil head in a four-centred arch. The gable end of an earlier nave roof is visible internally in the east wall of the tower.

The nave retains its late 12th or early 13th-century origin, with walls pierced by north and south arcades added in the early 14th century. The roof was raised in the 15th century to accommodate a clerestory, which has three windows on each side, each of three cinquefoil lights in a four-centred head. Two windows at the west end are earlier with reticulated tracery in two-centred arches, suggesting there may have been a 14th-century clerestory that was replaced or rebuilt in the 15th century.

The south aisle dates from the early 14th century and was extended one bay westward around 1475. It contains two 14th-century windows of two trefoil lights with reticulated tracery and one restored 15th-century three-light window corresponding to the bay addition. The south doorway has been much restored.

The chancel is of late 12th to early 13th-century date, built externally of fieldstone with a steeply pitched tiled roof. The south wall contains an original window of two lights with Y tracery in a two-centred arch and an early 14th-century window of two trefoil lights. The east wall has three original lancet windows in a much restored wall. The north wall displays similar fenestration to the south wall. The north aisle contains two early 14th-century windows of clunch with reticulated tracery. The porch and north doorway date from the 1876 to 1886 restoration.

A rood loft staircase occupies the angle between the south aisle and chancel.

Interior

The south nave arcade is probably late 13th or early 14th-century, originally of two bays. The arches are two-centred with two chamfered orders, resting on columns of quatrefoil section with moulded bases and capitals. A large bay to the west was added in the 15th century, contemporary with the tower. The north arcade is slightly later, with three bays. Its two-centred arches have one wave and one hollow moulded order with broach stops, supported on similar early 14th-century columns of quatrefoil section.

The roof dates from circa 1475 and features arch-braced tiebeams with moulded main beams. Carved bosses, including those of the donor and his wife, mark the intersections.

The north aisle contains a north chapel at its east end, with a 15th-century oak screen. The screen entrance front is eight bays in two stages. The lower stage is blocked with modern panelling, while the open upper stage displays subcusped ogee arches in square heads with vertical tracery to the spandrels and an embattled cornice.

The south aisle contains an early 14th-century piscina in its south wall, featuring trefoil cusping to an ogee arch with label and finial, and a quatrefoil drain.

The chancel arch is of wood, restored circa 1876, with a two-centred moulded arch dating to the 15th century and associated with the rood screen below. The box framing above the arch is 19th-century work. The rood screen retains much restored work to its upper stage, but the closed lower stage displays a frieze of running foliate ornament above panels with subcusping to two-centred arches in square heads with vertical tracery to spandrels. Each of the nine bays is divided by a pilaster buttress, larger than those at the pew ends in the nave and aisles. A rood loft stair opening is in a four-centred arch. The present rood dates from circa 1950.

The chancel has a moulded band at original sill height. The rear arches of the three lancets in the east wall are two-centred with dog-tooth ornament to the label carried over each arch. The roof dates to the 15th century and is similar to that in the chancel of St. Edmunds, Hauxton. It is steeply pitched, spans four bays, and has short king posts on arch-braced raised tiebeams, with carved bosses enriching the intersections.

The pews in the nave and aisles are late 15th to early 16th-century, probably contemporary with the chancel screen. They feature two-stage pilaster buttresses and roll moulding to the rail, with some unmoulded poppy head finials to the pew ends in the chancel.

The font bowl is of 12th-century or earlier origin, incorporated into later work.