Church Of All Saints

The Church of All Saints in Great Holland is a parish church, largely rebuilt around 1866 to the design of Sir Arthur Blomfield. It is constructed of flint with stone dressings. The west tower, however, originates from the 15th or 16th century and is built of red brick with black header diapering. The roofs are covered with red plain tiles, featuring pierced ridge tiles.

The church comprises a chancel, nave, north aisle, north vestry, and a south porch. The chancel’s east end features an angle buttress with stone gables, a moulded plinth, and lower and upper bands which continue below three graduated lancet windows, and over two south wall and one north wall lancets, concluding in a two-centred arched doorway on the south wall. The south wall of the nave has a moulded plinth, two buttresses, and three two-centred arched windows with two cusped lights, with cusped roundels above each. A gabled south porch projects forward with buttresses and a moulded two-centred arched doorway, bearing a stone roundel inscribed “IHS” above. The north aisle is a lean-to structure with three buttresses, and two small, cusped, two-centred arched windows in each bay, with a doorway on the east wall. A gabled north-west vestry has a three-light window with a square head to its north wall, and a segmental-headed doorway to the west wall. A small western vestry has a hipped roof to the north, a buttress to the north-west angle, a single light window to the north, and a door to the west.

The crenellated west tower consists of three stages, with a raised and crenellated semi-octagonal stair turret to the south-east. Semi-octagonal buttresses define the other tower angles. A brick moulded plinth runs around the base. The west window is of moulded brick with four pointed lights, vertical tracery above, a two-centred head, and a label. The western doorway is also of moulded and chamfered brick, with a two-centred head and jambs of three orders, surmounted by a label. Small, chamfered louvres with segmental pointed heads are set into the north and south walls. The bell chamber has a cusped two-light louvre with vertical tracery above a two-centred head, and a moulded brick label on each face. A memorial mallet used at the laying of the stone on 4th August 1865 indicates that “The Tower and Original Church date from 1413.”

Internally, the chancel is barrel vaulted and the nave has a roof supported by arched braces on stone corbels. 19th-century stained glass windows are present. Notable features include a carved wood altar, a four-bay north arcade with plastered, chamfered two-centred arches, moulded capitals, and bases to circular columns. There is also a 19th-century octagonal font with a wooden cover, a 19th-century octagonal carved wood pulpit on a stone base, and a two-centred tower arch of four chamfered orders. A monument to Henry Rice (1812), by Hinchliffe of London, depicts a kneeling mourning female figure. The church is graded II* for the fine quality of the tower.