Church Of St Columba

Church of St Columba

Parish church, built in 1868-9 by architect James Brooks, with a mortuary chapel added in 1904-5 by E. Geldart. The building is constructed in red brick with stone dressings and slate roofs, designed in the Early English style.

The plan is cruciform, comprising a nave with aisles, transepts, chancel and a central tower. The west end presents a cliff-like facade, with four lower lancets linked by a continuous pointed hoodmould. Brick string courses run across the elevation, with two stone courses to the lower part of three triple stepped upper lancets. A single encircled sexfoil oculus sits in the gable head, accompanied by three smaller cusped roundels. The upper corners of the elevation are developed into square turrets with pinnacles.

The lean-to aisles are reduced in height without windows, with dentilled string courses beneath. The south aisle features a four-centred doorway. Five two-light clerestory windows consist of twin lancets supporting an octofoiled circle. The north aisle has a full-height west porch with triple arched openings to the ground floor under a continuous pointed hoodmould, with twin lancets above under a continuous rounded hoodmould. The gable head contains three lancets, with a square honeycomb pattern of raised brickwork.

The tall shallow gabled transepts both carry similar corner pinnacles to the west front. The north transept has twin lancets supporting six roundels. The south transept features a circular stair tower and marks of a demolished building that once abutted it.

The square crossing tower has flat buttresses towards the transepts, with two lancets to each face (with two stone stringcourses), and a short pyramid spire.

The chancel projects one bay. Its east end has three flat buttresses to the lower half, flanking two cusped niches below twin lancets. The lancets have continuous hoodmoulds. The gable has an oculus, roundels and corner pinnacles matching the west front.

Internally, the five-bay arcade comprises circular piers with four radiating detached colonnettes with annuli. The capitals are roughly finished blocks. Triple stepped pointed arcade arches and continuous hoodmoulds run throughout. Similar hoodmoulds appear on the clerestory windows. The colonnettes rise from the pier to support wall posts of the arch-braced roof, with arched braces meeting the lower collars and a second register of arched collars above.

The north porch is open to a quadripartite rib vault, with walls treated in panels of bull-nosed brick chequerwork. The upper north windows include a wall passage and columns, with the centre niche blind. The aisles feature transverse brick arches acting as internal flying buttresses and supporting a conventional timber roof. At the west end of the north aisle is an elaborate staircase to the mortuary chapel, featuring an openwork twin cusped arch on a central colonnette under a quatrefoil vesica. The staircase balustrade has four open encircled quatrefoils, repeated to the south and east sides of the landing above twin lancets. A statuary niche with canopy sits at the south-east corner, with two open arches below.

The south aisle has an elaborate doorway at its east end, with pedestals for statues on either side, dying mouldings in the arch and upper corbelled statue pedestals. Two shouldered arched recesses sit to the west. Triple chamfered crossing arches with colonnettes open onto a quadripartite rib vault with a central roundel.

The north transept vault consists of three brick transverse arches; the south transept has plastered plain arches. The chancel vault contains five ribs, all on colonnettes with capitals. A stone reredos of five gablets, each over a panel depicting Adoration scenes, stands at the east end.

The font is a circular drum surrounded by eight orbiting porphyry columns on Early English bases, with an octagonal marble bowl decorated with two-light tracery designs to the facets and a timber traceried cover.

The pulpit is polygonal with a panelled black marble base supporting an elaborate honey-coloured marble parapet with irontwist balusters and rectangular corner pieces featuring columns and cusped statuary niches. The rear walls of the recesses are decorated with gold tesserae. A timber back panel and canopy feature panelling and thin rib vaulting, with a floral scroll in the cornice and top cusping. Carved angels sit at the corners.