Church Of St Gabriel

Church of St Gabriel, Warwick Square, is a parish church built 1851-3 to the designs of Thomas Cundy II, working with his son Thomas Cundy III, with John Kelk as contractor. The spire was rebuilt and a choir vestry added in 1887-88 by J.P. St. Aubyn. Outer aisles, a west porch and south-east chapel were added 1896-97 by architects Baker and Turrill, with John Thompson of Peterborough as contractor.

The church is built of Kentish ragstone rubble. It originally had Bath stone dressings and spire, but these were replaced, and the spire rebuilt, in white stone (presumably Portland stone) during the 1887-88 works. The roofs are covered with blue Welsh slate, with lead flats over the centre of the outer aisles.

The five-bay nave has a clerestory and double aisles, the inner aisles being taller and constructed as lean-tos, while the outer aisles have individual gabled bays. The three-bay chancel is lower than the nave. A gabled south-east chapel with a polygonal apse is set against the south chancel wall. A gabled vestry lies to the north, with a taller gabled choir vestry beyond it. There is a gabled south porch, a western gabled porch or narthex, and a north porch beneath the south-west tower, which is topped with a spire.

The architectural style is Decorated Gothic. Most windows feature geometrical tracery. The clerestory has simple two-light windows with cusped heads and roundels. The outer aisles have more elaborate tall two-light windows arranged in two stages, with flanking lancets. The large six-light west window has cusped quatrefoils and an upper circular light filled with cusped trefoils. The east window is elaborate, with curvilinear tracery, ogees and a large roundel.

The tower is buttressed and built of ashlar, with two-light traceried louvered openings to the belfry, octagonal pinnacles and a parapet pierced with trefoils. The setback broach spire has three tiers of lucarnes and is topped with an iron cross finial.

The interior is designed throughout in the Decorated Gothic style. An arcaded narthex beneath the west gallery occupies the sixth nave bay. This is a rebuilt vestige of the original galleries that surrounded three sides of the nave before their removal in 1896-97. The nave arcade is tall, supported on slender clustered columns with roll-moulded capitals and moulded arches. Two-light clerestory windows are positioned above the centre of each bay. Elaborately carved foliated corbels, attributed to Samuel Cundy (nephew of Thomas Cundy), act as bases for the open timber roof structure above the nave, which is arch-braced with crown-posts above tie beams, with trusses at bay and intermediate bay intervals. The inner and outer aisles are separated by a lower version of the nave arcade. The aisles are roofed with wooden ribbed vaulting with boarded infill.

The moulded chancel arch is raised on tall, slender clustered columns. The three-bay chancel has a painted, moulded-ribbed and panelled roof. The south-east chapel, which has a moulded-ribbed and panelled roof, is separated from the chancel by a broad arched opening. A moulded arch, raised on corbelled colonettes, leads to the polygonal, rib-vaulted apse.

The chancel was substantially reordered and embellished between 1890-97. The altar, designed by J.F. Bentley (1839-1902) and dedicated in 1890, is of mahogany with a carved panelled, painted and gilded frontal. The central panel shows Christ the King, flanked by Saints Gabriel and Michael, with outer panels depicting three angels, all beneath ogee heads against a gilded background.

The reredos, chancel wall decoration, sedilia, communion rails, and sanctuary and chancel paving all form part of a decorative scheme costing £1,400, paid for by Lord Edward Pelham-Clinton in memory of his wife and carried out by James Powell and Company in 1897. The reredos, flanked by tall carved painted and gilded mahogany pinnacles, has a broad panel painted with the Crucifixion. Flanking panels on the east wall and return walls are in alabaster with moulded ogee-arched frames, each containing a figure of a prophet incised, coloured and highlighted with gilding, executed in opus sectile. There is a frieze of angel heads, a moulded cornice, and a decorative parapet of richly carved stone poppy heads.

The sedilia consists of triple seating niches, panelled and elaborately carved in mahogany in flamboyant Gothic style with ogee heads and elaborate finials. A panel above the arch to the south-east chapel apse depicts Christ with the Doctors in coloured and gilded opus sectile, set in a moulded and carved alabaster frame in the lower part of the second window in the south chancel wall.

The sanctuary and chancel paving consists of marble altar steps, the top white and inlaid with patterns, the lower step of red veined marble, with paving in red and white with patterns of squares and diamonds. Similar paving runs throughout the chancel. The communion rails have a moulded hardwood top rail on gilded metal railings with central gates, featuring scrollwork and modelled motifs representing the fruits of the earth and the vine, with pierced panels of lettering.

The organ case, positioned on the north chancel wall immediately within the chancel arch, dates from 1892-93 and is attributed to Arthur Bloomfield, carried out by organ builder James Binns. It is of elaborate carved and moulded hardwood, framing two stages of display pipes, with mixed Gothic and Baroque motifs.

The choir stalls, dating from 1897, are of carved and moulded hardwood with pierced arched frontals and bench ends with carved poppy heads. The vicar's stall, also 1897 and by Bridgeman of Lichfield, has a moulded, panelled and pierced frontal, moulded and carved ends with an inset panel and elaborate poppy head finial.

The east window, from 1896 by C.E. Kempe, is five-light with two stages of figures: Christ in Majesty at the centre, surrounded by angels, apostles and kings. The south chancel window, also 1896 by C.E. Kempe, is two-light and depicts a nativity scene. (A chancel screen from 1898, of low scrolled ironwork, was temporarily dismounted at the time of inspection.)

The south-east chapel contains former flanking panels from the east chancel wall, reset against the south wall in 1869, of stone and mosaic by Salvati. These consist of a four-arched arcade, originally set in pairs either side of the original reredos. The niches have mosaic patternwork within gilded trellises, with figures of the apostles on a gold mosaic background above. The arches are raised on marble colonettes with carved cusped heads, with modelled angels between and richly carved foliage above, and mosaic scrollwork between the outer arch heads. The chapel screen, dating from about 1897, is of iron with scrollwork, twists, central gates, ogee scrollwork traceried heads, and a castellated scrollwork cornice.

The pulpit, adjoining the north reveal of the chancel arch, was designed by J.P. St. Aubyn in 1875. It has a moulded cream superstructure of brass posts and scrollwork, with stone steps and brass handrail.

The font, in the north bay of the outer south aisle, dates from about 1853 and is by Samuel Cundy. It is carved cream Bath stone, with an octagonal bowl featuring Celtic and fleur-de-lys motifs in relief, raised on a central shaft with eight colonettes with carved foliated capitals.

In the early 19th century, Pimlico was part of the Parish of St George, Hanover Square, formed in 1725. The development of Belgravia, and subsequently Pimlico, by Thomas Cubitt employed by the Grosvenor Family, began in the 1820s and gathered momentum. In 1827, the Parish of St Peter, Pimlico, was created, out of which St Gabriel, Warwick Square was carved in 1850. Private legislation passed in 1850 provided that the new parish church would generate sufficient revenue from pew-rents to provide a repair fund, administrative expenses of the new parish, and a stipend of £600 for the incumbent. The cost of construction of the new church was partly raised by subscription, to which the Second Marquess of Westminster added £5,000 of the total cost of £9,360, and gave the freehold of the site. The church, which originally had galleries on three sides around the nave, initially seated 1,150 and was consecrated on 12 May 1852 by Dr Blomfield, Bishop of London.

The architect, Thomas Cundy II, working with his son Thomas Cundy III, designed five churches on the Belgravia and Pimlico estates of the Grosvenor Family, of which St Gabriel's was the third. They also designed many secular buildings on the estates. Thomas Cundy II was surveyor to the Grosvenor Estate for 41 years.

St Gabriel's was altered and embellished between 1890-97, reflecting the influence and patronage of leading parishioners. The new aisles were dedicated by the Bishop of London, Mr Frederick Temple, on 1 March 1897, and the newly decorated chancel furnishings were dedicated on Shrove Tuesday 1898. Little alteration has subsequently taken place, although the church suffered damage from a Second World War flying bomb on 29 July 1944.