Keston Parish Church

Keston Parish Church is a Grade II* listed building with origins in the 12th century, with the chancel dating to the early 13th century. The church underwent restoration in the 18th century, and was significantly restored and enlarged to the west around 1880 by Henry Blackwell. The north porch was added in 1883, and the east wall was rebuilt in the 1950s following Second World War bomb damage. The remains of a former south tower were discovered in the mid-20th century.

The building is constructed of flint rubble with stone dressings and has tiled roofs. The plan comprises a nave with north and south porches, a west bellcote with continuous chancel, and a large L-shaped complex of modern parish rooms to the southwest joined to the nave.

The exterior features a 19th-century west window with reticulated tracery. Above it sits a small stone bellcote with a timber louvered bell-chamber running along the roof ridge. The nave roof has two small polygonal vents. The north wall of the nave has three single-light windows with trefoiled cusping. A timber north porch on dwarf brick walls is dated 1883. The 13th-century north door has moulded orders and capitals. The south nave wall has two single-light windows with shouldered segmental heads, probably 18th-century in origin. The eastern window is set within blocking for the former southeast tower arch, with brick quoining marking the ends of the former tower walls. The 13th-century south door is now within the vestibule to the parish rooms complex and was unblocked to provide access from the nave. The chancel has two cusped lancets on either side, partly renewed. The chancel east wall was rebuilt in 1950 following bomb damage, with a single large-light east window with a slightly pointed head replacing an earlier two-light window. The church rooms on the southwest were added in 1992.

The interior contains a late 12th or early 13th-century chancel arch that is pointed with a single chamfered order on chamfered imposts. The former south tower arch has an unchamfered order on an impost with a carved head dating to the 12th century. A timber west organ gallery dates from 1733, lengthened and rebuilt in 1880 when the nave was lengthened.

Principal fixtures include a 13th-century trefoiled piscina in the chancel, chancel panelling with blind tracery panels added after 1883, an 18th-century painting of Moses formerly part of a pair with Aaron from an altarpiece, and Royal arms in the style used after 1837, painted on leather and framed.

The stained glass includes a window by Morris and Company dating to 1909 depicting Love, with fragments of the matching Faith, Prayer and Hope, damaged during the Second World War, reset in the west window. The chancel windows date to 1952 and are by James Blackford.

Monuments include a Grecian wall tablet for George Kirkpatrick, died 1838, and a small metal coffin plate for John Pepys, died 1749, brother of the diarist Samuel Pepys.

The writer Dinah Maria Craik (née Mulock, 1826-1887), well known for her mid-19th-century works including 'John Halifax, Gentleman' (1856), is buried at the church.

Evidence of Roman and Romano-British settlement exists at Keston, with apparently Romano-British graves discovered under the chancel east wall during excavations in 1950. Keston is recorded in Domesday Book, though the church itself is not mentioned. The present structure is Norman in origin.