Church Of St Mary The Virgin

Church of St Mary the Virgin

Church, 1902-4. Designed by architect C Harrison Townsend with interior decoration and fittings by W Reynolds Stephens in the Art Nouveau style. The building is constructed of rough cast with oolitic limestone dressings and peg tiled roofs.

The plan consists of a nave and narrower chancel with apse, with transeptal projections on the south and north sides containing a chapel and organ chamber with vestry respectively. At the west end stands a small belfry tower with shingled spirelet and three louvred openings on each face.

Externally, all windows are of lancet form unless otherwise stated. The south elevation shows a single window, a pair of windows under a gable, a buttress, three grouped windows, and a south chapel transept with diagonal buttressed corners and a broad two-centred arched window with heart-shaped tracery. The nave has two pairs of windows separated by an intervening buttress. A south porch, flanked by buttresses and projecting in Essex style, is timber-framed on a roughcast base with a central ogee arched head and cusped side openings. The porch has a barge board with inscription, a boarded door with ornamental hinges and dedication inscription above, and rainwater down pipes with leaf-decorated heads.

The north elevation runs east to west and shows a single window, a pair of windows, and a north vestry transept that is buttressed and gabled with a central segment-headed doorway with boarded door. The organ chamber is integral to the build but set back with a buttressed corner, hipped roof, and two rectangular paired windows with leaded panes. The nave has four pairs of windows separated by buttresses, with rainwater down pipes matching those on the south. The east end elevation shows the north vestry with a pair of tall narrow windows on its east side with leaded panes.

The west elevation displays the nave with angle buttresses and, at ground floor level, seven narrow rectangular windows spanning the full width. Above these rises a rose window featuring a central roundel with eight radiating tracery hearts.

The interior contains an exceptional ensemble of Art Nouveau fittings. The nave roof is constructed of timber with a two-centred arch creating a broad vault. Five bays contain ribs decorated with embossed rose trees in aluminium leaf. The south chancel window glass was destroyed during the Second World War and has been partially replaced by memorial windows. Walls are wood-panelled below with marquetry inlay. Pendant lights feature galvanised iron frames with enamel panels, flower bud metal shades, and glass bead finials.

The font is of white marble with a central bowl and pedestal, two attached side pillars surmounted by bronze angels, and a bronze font cover with mother-of-pearl inlay. The pulpit is cruciform in copper sheet with rivet heads featured and mother-of-pearl inlay panels. It bears a central IHS in repoussé, with the arms of the cross supported by bronze triple-stemmed trees and a black marble podium. The lectern, similarly constructed in copper sheet as the pulpit, features decorative rivets and mother-of-pearl inlay panels, with a desk top supported by flowering branches and a black marble plinth.

The rood screen consists of brass rose trees on variegated green and white marble screen walls, with a crest of continuous frieze of dog-roses in mother-of-pearl and enamel with supporting angels and a central upper cross.

The chancel features a two-centred arch, and the apse has lower panels of cippolino variegated marble with aluminium leaf above. Embossed paired ribs carry stylised vine leaves and red-painted grapes rising to a deep frieze of similar leaves and grapes. A small lancet window opening contains the only original stained glass. The roof is similar to the nave with slender aluminium ribs. The reredos shows a central metal embossed figure of Christ with decorative flanking panels depicting the Entombment and the Nativity. The altar rail is metal with brass crowns of thorns containing triple roses on dark green marble pillars.

The side chapel has a wooden parclose screen with posts terminating in linked poppy leaves with flowers above in the top rail. The organ case is constructed in iron with brass repoussé cladding and a central ormolu angel on a projecting beak of canopy, supported by iron side screens with bulb flowers.

The building was largely the gift of Evelyn Heseltine, who donated £5,000. The architect and artist reproduced the very modern Art Nouveau styling faithfully, with the church described as having "an orgy of the English Arts and Crafts variety of the International Art Nouveau". Townsend, who worked in East London, designed several buildings now known as landmarks in English Art Nouveau architecture, including the entrance to Blackwall Tunnel, the Horniman Museum at Forest Hill, and the Whitechapel Art Gallery. The Church and lych gate form a group.