Church of the Ascension

Church of the Ascension

An Anglican church built in 1957, designed by John Harold Gibbons with Derrick Humphrys and Reginald Hurst. The church is constructed of stock brick with vitrified headers, limestone dressings and clay roof tiles. The interior features hardwood doors, floors and fixtures.

Due to the constrained site, the church is oriented north-west to south-east, though in the following description compass points refer to liturgical direction. The building comprises an aisled nave of two bays and a single-bay chancel with transept-like projections to the north and south, and a Lady Chapel beyond the southern projection. Above the narthex at the west entrance is a choir gallery, with an organ chamber to the south.

The exterior is of stock brick with a continuous corbel table of red tile. The corner projections are treated as tall cross-wings with variously hipped or gabled roofs. The Lady Chapel is a single-storey structure with a flat roof and a shaped concrete rainwater gargoyle. Windows are square-headed three-light openings and tall lancets with traceried or cusped heads. The west front features a chamfered plinth, an arched central entrance with hoodmould, and a carved consecration cross. At the east end stands a slim octagonal bell turret with a relief of the Crucifixion, terminating in an ashlar bell stage with latticed openings and an ogee dome.

The interior is entered from the west via a narthex with panelled oak doors and shutters flanked by stepped piers. The narthex west wall incorporates architectural fragments from St Mary's Church Harrow, St Paul's Cathedral and Canterbury Cathedral, acknowledging the churches of the deanery, diocese and ecclesiastical province. The church interior is finished in lime render, providing a neutral ground for brightly coloured vaulting schemes. The nave vault is painted blue with yellow mouldings, the chancel vault decorated in gold with blue stars and red ribs, whilst the side projections use red and green. The floor is hardwood parquet, with quarry tiles to the chancel and narthex. Pendant lights illuminate the nave with bracket lights in the aisles.

The central nave has a wooden tunnel vault and wide unmoulded arcade arches springing low from chamfered piers. The aisle bays are articulated by half arches. Those to the north develop from internal buttresses incorporating a passage aisle with shouldered arches, whilst those to the south spring from wall arches with deep round arches. The Lady Chapel has a low ceiling with deep beams and mullioned windows set in deep round-arched recesses. At the west end of the north aisle is the former baptistery, now St Anselm's Chapel. An octagonal ashlar font stands in front of the west door, with the organ console and steps to the choir gallery opposite.

Three splayed recesses are set into the east wall, incorporating a passage aisle at the base. The visual focus of the interior is the Feibusch Ascension mural occupying the tall central recess. It depicts Christ rising into heaven, drawn by three angels and witnessed by the Apostles, with representational figures rendered in intense, expressive colour with vibrant mid-tones. A ribbed vault rises above. The chancel is defined by oak altar rails and dark Purbeck marble steps. Low side walls with built-in clergy seats and Purbeck tops include a small scalloped piscina. The wooden pulpit is currently located at the east end of the north aisle. Stained glass is by various makers: Leonard Walker (floriated design in the chancel passage aisle), W T Carter Shapland (St Anselm in the baptistery, abstract panels in the Lady Chapel and St Michael in the north transept) and G E R Smith (Dorcas, Hannah and Samuel and the Magnificat in the Lady Chapel).

To the north-east of the church are a vestry and other rooms for clergy use, fitted with oak cupboards, parquet flooring and panelled doors and architraves.

The church grounds lie slightly below street level. The area to the west of the main entrance is paved and bounded to the north and east by a brick retaining wall.