Church of St Mary, Whitton is a Grade II listed building in the Ipswich local planning authority area, England. First listed on 26 October 1987. Church.
Church of St Mary, Whitton
- WRENN ID
- vast-moat-gold
- Grade
- II
- Local Planning Authority
- Ipswich
- Constituency
- Central Suffolk and North Ipswich MP: Patrick Spencer (Con)
- Country
- England
- Date first listed
- 26 October 1987
- Type
- Church
- Address
- Church of St Mary, Whitton, Church Lane
- OS grid reference
- TM 149 476
- Coordinates
- 52.08586, 1.13654
- Source
- Historic England listing
Description
The Church of St Mary in Whitton is a parish church with origins dating back to the late 13th century. It was largely rebuilt in the 1850s and enlarged in 1862, with further alterations in the 1880s by F Barnes, including the addition of a south west tower and south aisle. The church is constructed of flint with stone dressings, and has plain tile roofs, some with cresting.
The church comprises a nave, chancel, north and south aisles, a north chapel and vestry, and a south west tower. The south west tower has three stages with a spire, featuring clasping pilasters with bell bases. A circa 1300 doorway is reset on the south face, decorated with a scrollmoulded arch and hood, shafts with undercut mouldings to the caps, and a single light opening to the west face. Further openings are present on the middle stage, and two-light openings with late 13th century plate tracery style are found on the upper stage. The stone spire has a tall lucarne on each face and is topped with a foliate cross. The west window of the nave, dating from the 19th century, has three lights of simple slender tracery.
The south aisle, added in 1862, incorporates remnants of the earlier Church of St Botolph. It features three bays with buttresses, three paired lancet windows, and a quatrefoil on the east gable. The north aisle, also from the 19th century, has a west window of two-light plate tracery and single lancet windows to each bay. The east window has two encircled trefoils beneath an encircled cinquefoil.
Inside the church, a four-bay north arcade is supported by polygonal piers, while a three-bay south arcade features drum piers with polygonal responds. Both arcades have double chamfered arches and moulded caps. The chancel arch has two chamfered orders on polygonal responds with moulded caps. The nave has a canted and boarded roof, possibly the original structure, while the chancel retains a largely 14th-century collar roof with straight braces. Niches flank the east window, possibly original, featuring cusped heads on engaged shafts under a moulded hood. A piscina with a cusped head is also present. A three-bay open arcade runs along the north wall. Morris glass is located in the north-eastern north aisle window. A circular font bowl features a blank arcade on the central drum and four outer shafts. Various fittings, reportedly from Sudbury Church, are present, including benches with halved poppy-head bench ends and cowled figure heads.
Local climate
Church of St Mary, Whitton sits in one of the driest parts of the UK, with an average of 700 mm of rain a year. This makes it drier than 91% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is lower than that of 67% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 24 freeze-thaw cycles a year, fewer than 74% of listed buildings. Of these, 12 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.
Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.
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