Church Of St James

The Church of St James is a church constructed between 1827 and 1829, designed by James Savage. It was built as one of the London Commissioners' churches, receiving significant funding—£17,666 from the commissioners and further contributions from the parish totalling £21,412.

The building is constructed of stock brick with yellow stone dressings, covered by a pitched slate roof. The plan is rectangular, comprising a two-storey church with a tetrastyle Ionic portico at the west end, a nave with a clerestory, and aisles, with eight-bay elevations to the north and south. A two-stage tower rests on an abutment, with stone quoins breaking out from the clerestory at the west end.

The stone portico features unfluted Ionic columns supporting an architrave, frieze, and dentil cornice topped with a pediment. Corner pilasters rest on a stone plinth, and stone cornices with a blocking course define the aisle and clerestory sections. The west end has a giant panelled door, with stone architraves, friezes and cornices flanked by lower doors with stone panels above. Tall, square-headed windows with battered stone architraves and leaded lights are present in the aisles, with six matching clerestory windows to the north and south, recessed within segmental brick arches. The tower’s lower stage has Doric pilasters with round-arched, louvred bell openings on each face; the upper stage is more Baroque, featuring groups of three columns at the angles supporting urns. The spire is surmounted by a gilt ball, spike, and a large flying gilt dragon weather vane.

The interior was altered in 1965, with the west end and aisles divided off to create separate rooms, with roofs sloping inward to accommodate a stepped gallery. A gallery is supported by square piers around three sides, with Ionic columns above supporting a clerestory wall and a cornice. Paired columns rise to the cornice and extend as paired beams across the roof, which features a deeply coffered ceiling. Large paterae are incorporated within the roof bays to the gallery. The organ, by Bishop and Son (1829), is housed in a round-arched western extension of the west gallery. A corresponding, round-arched eastern extension, now the reordered sanctuary, contains a large painting of the Ascension.