Church Of All Saints

A Church of England parish church built in two phases between 1890–92 and 1911–12 to designs by the architectural practice of JEK and JP Cutts of 28 Southampton Street, The Strand. The church underwent alterations in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Construction and Materials

The church is built of red brick laid in English bond with Bath stone dressings. The roofs are covered with clay tiles. The building demonstrates high-quality stonework and detailing throughout, particularly evident in the window tracery and chancel panelling.

Plan and Layout

The church comprises a five-bay nave with five-bay apsidal chancel, narthex, west and north porches, north and south aisles, transepts, south chapel, north vestries, north organ loft, and parish rooms inserted at the west end of the nave.

Exterior

The church is designed in the Perpendicular style. The west front features a slightly canted narthex containing a large four-centred, five-light arched window with curvilinear tracery, flanked by two-light pointed windows on either side. Within the gable end of the nave, the west window has a similar four-centred arched form but with six lights, more elaborate tracery, and an ogee finial to the arch. A large stone, square-headed entrance was introduced below the narthex window during the late 1980s or early 1990s alterations. The two original entrances are set in porches projecting forward from the west ends of the aisles to either side of the narthex. These porches have four-centred arches within square-headed frames with deep elaborate mouldings and fleuron decoration to the arch, label, and spandrels. Above the entrances are the four-centred arches of the aisles. The west elevation is finished with stone banding, string courses, buttresses with sloping stone capping, and projecting angel sculptures positioned on the moulding above the narthex window and at the springing point of the west window.

The side elevations of the nave are divided into five bays. Each bay of the clerestory is separated by brick pilasters and contains two four-centred arched windows. The bays of the aisles are flanked by buttresses, with each bay containing a window set in a pointed arch. The south transept features a large five-light pointed window with curvilinear tracery, while the north transept has a rose window. Adjoining the north transept is the sacristy/choir vestry with a flat-roofed porch. Adjoining the south transept is the south chapel, which has a two-light, square-headed window with ogee tracery on the south elevation and a three-light, four-centred arched window in the gabled east elevation.

The apsidal chancel has a five-bay east end with the bays separated by buttresses topped by aedicules with pinnacles rising above. These are linked just below the battlemented parapet by a tablet flower moulding. Each bay contains a tall, two-light, pointed arched window with panel tracery. A date stone inscribed "7 October 1911" is affixed to the chancel. The division between the nave and chancel roofs is marked by a tall, gabled stone bellcote.

Interior

The interior has a red brick finish with stone dressings and banding, except for the west end of the nave which has been plastered (with a plastered ceiling under the late 20th-century organ loft) and the stone panelling of the chancel. The floors are mainly softwood parquet, probably installed in the 1970s, although the chancel retains its original polychrome tiling.

The hammer-beam roof of the nave rests on simple stone corbels and has wind-bracing to the purlins and iron tie-rods. The apsidal chancel also has a hammer-beam roof with a carved ceiling boss.

The west end of the church has been significantly altered. Besides the new entrance with its glazed wooden doors, the three two-centred arches from the narthex to the nave have been infilled (as have the two four-centred arches from the original entrance porches), and an organ loft has been introduced at the west end of the nave, cutting across the first two bays of the nave arcade. The area below the organ loft has been screened off from the remainder of the nave by cut-down sections of the timber rood screen, originally installed in front of the chancel arch in 1911. Over the screen is a panelled timber balcony to the organ loft. The aisles have also been blocked off and a kitchen/service area created at the west end of the south aisle.

The nave arcades have two-centred arches with compound piers, as do the tall chancel and transept arches. Below the recessed clerestory windows is a tablet flower moulding matching that on the exterior.

The south chapel has been enlarged by blocking the four-centred arch from the south aisle to the south transept and introducing a glazed pine screen across the transept arch. Similarly, a new vestry has been created in the north transept (originally the site of the organ) by the same method. The south chapel contains an aumbry with double foiled arches and hood mould.

The chancel has ornate stone panelling decorated with blind arches with trefoil heads, extending in three tiers in the blind arches between the windows. The former choir vestry and sacristy remain to the north of the chancel.

Fittings and Furnishings

The original choir stalls and pulpit have been removed, although the church always had chairs rather than pews in the rest of the building. The font is of Bath stone with a multi-foil bowl-and-stem design and engaged colonnettes to the stem. The main altar is of marble with wooden Gothic altar rails from 1912.

The altar in the south chapel has an altarpiece and frontal by the influential 20th-century embroiderer Beryl Dean (1911–2001), titled The Golden Madonna and created between 1991 and 1994. A rood cross, originally from St Thomas's, Bethnal Green, was added in the 1950s.

A wooden First World War memorial panel with Gothic tracery and crucifix stands in front of the blocked west arch in the north aisle.

The organ was originally installed in a Wesleyan chapel in Clapham in 1878 by the firm of Alfred Hunter and was relocated to All Saints' in 1951. It was rebuilt when moved to the current organ loft.

Stained Glass

The early 20th-century east window of the south chapel depicts the Madonna and Child flanked by angels and is by Burlison and Grylls. Panels of saints in the central window of the chancel are by George J Hunt of 2 Sydney Grove, Old Hendon. Most windows have plain glass.

History and Context

The first phase of construction took place between 1890 and 1892 to designs by JEK and JP Cutts, built on land given by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. A consolidated chapelry was assigned in 1900 from Holy Trinity, East Finchley and St James's, Muswell Hill, and the Ecclesiastical Commissioners made further grants for building and endowment. From 1900 the church was a vicarage in the patronage of the Bishop of London.

A perspective drawing by the architects shows that the church was originally designed to have a prominent steeple to the north-east. This is not shown on the original ground plan, which depicts the church with a temporary chancel. An apsidal chancel, transepts, and a sacristy and choir vestry to the north-east where the steeple had been intended were added in 1911–12.

An adjacent church hall was built in 1935 and subsequently demolished in the 1980s. Reordering took place in the late 1980s and early 1990s, including the re-siting of the rood screen, organ, and font; alterations to the entrance; creation of the new organ loft; and the removal of the choir stalls.

The Architects

John Edward Knight Cutts (1847–1938) was articled to the well-known and prolific church architect Ewan Christian from 1865 to 1870, after which he set up in independent practice. His younger brother, John Priston Cutts (1854–1935), was articled to him in 1877, remained as an assistant, and was a partner by 1886. Cutts senior was diocesan surveyor for St Albans from 1881 to 1887. The firm developed a busy church architecture practice and specialised in generously-proportioned, economically-modest buildings, typically of red brick in the Early English style, designed to meet the great demand for new churches at the end of the 19th century.

Significance

The church occupies a prominent suburban hillside location and is valued for its imposing late-Victorian Perpendicular design by a notable architectural practice. Its proportions and attention to detail, both internally and externally, raise it above the standard of many large suburban churches of this period. The impressive hammer-beam roof and high-quality stonework contribute significantly to its architectural character.