Church Of The Sacred Heart

This Roman Catholic parish church was built between 1887 and 1901 by the architect Frederick Walters for the Jesuit community. The project was funded initially by Edith Avendrup, a wealthy widow and member of the Courtauld family, and from 1898 by Mrs Caroline Currie. The church was consecrated in 1931 and reordered in 1990.

Materials and Construction

The church is constructed of limestone and dark grey knapped flint in the Late Decorated Gothic style, with tile roofs.

Plan

The building comprises an eight-bay nave with north and south aisles. The main entrance is through the west front beneath a narthex, with an organ loft and gallery above. Off the north aisle is a canted baptistery and a rectangular chapel dedicated to St Ignatius, with confessionals between them. The sanctuary is polygonal and three bays long, narrower than the nave, with an open arcade leading to an ambulatory. Three apsidal chapels open off the ambulatory at the east end. To the north of the sanctuary are inner and outer sacristies, with a community tribune overlooking the choir and a music room at first-floor level.

Exterior

West Front

The west front is flanked by slender octagonal turrets. A six-light window with curvilinear tracery sits above a canopied porch. The turrets have slender western buttresses to their lower stages and small rectangular stair windows set in flush stone bands. The upper stages feature louvred, foiled bell openings, each beneath a canopy and topped with chequerwork flint and stone embattled parapets. The canted porch has a pierced stone parapet above an entrance of multiple moulded arches on slender shafts beneath a crocketed canopy, flanked by plain buttress shafts. The tympanum contains a seated figure of Our Lady and Child flanked by quatrefoil lozenges. The oak doors have robust iron fittings. The west window's six narrow lights rise beneath flowing tracery, flanked by slender shafts under a shallow embattled parapet. Above, in the gable, is a small two-light window flanked by sunk blind circular panels, with a small cross at the gable end.

South Elevation

The nave and chancel are under a continuous roof when viewed from the south. Each bay of the nave has a two-light aisle window between square offset buttresses, all beneath a pierced stone parapet. The south entrance, beneath a simple moulded hood, is reached by stone steps within a stone and flint parapet wall. The English Martyrs' altar projects forward on the south elevation and is gabled with a three-light window. A three-light window lights the west end of the aisle. Large three-light clerestory windows to the nave and sanctuary are set between slender buttress shafts with tall finials, featuring differing intersecting and reticulated tracery. The nave has a solid chequerwork parapet; the sanctuary, which has a taller eaves line, has pierced trefoil panels in its parapet. The lower stage of the sanctuary is in chequerwork stone and flint, including an embattled parapet. Window reveals are shallow beneath depressed arches, each with a small foiled glazed light between similar blind foiled panels. Each bay is defined by a robust flying buttress. The division between nave and chancel is marked by a staged offset buttress wall surmounted by a shaft that has lost its finial.

East End

The sanctuary is canted, with three-light windows featuring curvilinear tracery between flying buttresses, some of which have lost their finials. The pierced trefoil parapet continues from the north and south fronts. Three canted chapels each have two-light windows with curvilinear tracery (the central chapel of different pattern) over a chequerwork base. Each chapel has angle buttresses surmounted by crocketed finials, all beneath a pierced quatrefoil parapet.

North Elevation

The clerestory stage matches the south front. The westernmost bay houses a canted baptistery, each bay with a single-light window. The St Ignatius chapel is of two bays, each with a two-light reticulated window and a small oval window in its west wall. A two-storey gabled bay has irregular two-light and single-light windows and an entrance beneath a simple moulded arch. Confessionals and offices between are under deep catslide tiled roofs with simple rectangular openings. Attached to the sanctuary is a three-bay, two-storey range housing the sacristies at ground floor level. Windows are of three lights, those at ground floor beneath depressed arches, those at first floor rectangular. All lower parapets are of chequerwork pattern.

Interior

Entrance and Narthex

A small panelled porch leads to a panelled lobby with a boarded ceiling featuring a deep moulded frieze and ribs. It has internal windows and part-glazed doors with cusped tracery above rectangular leaded lights.

Nave

A tall nave arcade, built in 1887, rises from quadrilateral piers with engaged shafts to a large, well-lit clerestory. Above the arcade are enriched canopied niches, each containing a figure of a Jesuit saint flanked by angels carrying instruments of the Passion. At the west end are encircled trefoil panels. The nave has a canted timber roof. The south aisle has an arch-braced roof; the north aisle roof is panelled with moulded ribs and carved bosses, with pierced and decorated braces. The organ loft over the west porch houses an organ by the firm of Walkers, installed in 1912.

South Aisle

Built in 1895, the south aisle has a small water stoup east of the south door. At the east end is the English Martyrs altar with carved figures, dated 1915, and an enriched stone water stoup to the right. Stained glass by Westlake depicts the martyrs Edmund Campion, John Fisher, Thomas More, Margaret Pole and Margaret Clitherow. A fine commemorative window by Hardman is at the west end.

North Aisle

Built in 1898 under the patronage of Mrs Caroline Currie, the north aisle features a baptistery at the west end with a ribbed stone roof and carved bosses, enclosed by fine embattled wrought iron gates with tall fleur-de-lys, installed in 1909. A stone octagonal font with carved panels has a very tall ornate timber cover. The St Ignatius chapel occupies two open bays beneath a stone vaulted roof with carved bosses. It is lined with enriched linenfold timber panelling and features paintings by Chevalier Tayler from 1904 depicting the life of St Ignatius. An alabaster altar with ox-blood marble panels carries a gilded triptych with painted panels surmounted by a panel depicting St Ignatius. To the right is a stone water stoup with a carved canopy. The chapel has a richly carved stone memorial to Mrs Caroline Currie, dated 1904. Flanking the chapel are confessionals, each with a moulded stone doorcase and cusped panelled door with bold iron fittings. A fine series of gilt panel paintings on the north aisle wall depicts the Stations of the Cross, to designs by JF Bentley and executed by the artist Innes Fripp. At the west end is a war memorial: a marble Pieta set before a timber panelled screen. At the aisle's east end, before the chancel, is a small Holy Souls Chapel from 1915 by Drysdale, in memory of Fr William Kerr, founder of the Jesuit Mission in Wimbledon. It has a plain polished stone enclosing wall and altar, above which is a carved stone reredos depicting souls in Purgatory. This is the only original structural element not to Walters' design. The north aisle stained glass is by Hardman. The nave retains its original seating of simple benches with shaped ends, some carved.

Pulpit

The timber pulpit, on a carved stone pedestal from 1901 by FA Walters, was formerly attached to the easternmost north aisle pier beneath a carved sounding board. In 1990 it was moved to its present position on the north side of the sanctuary arch when the canopy was removed.

Chancel

Built in 1894, the three-bay polygonal sanctuary has an open arcade of slender engaged shafts with rich stone springings for an ornate timber roof with moulded ribs and enriched bosses. Above the arcade, the wall is treated as a pierced stone screen. A richly carved water stoup is set against the south arcade. Stained glass in the east windows by Hardman depicts the Annunciation, Crucifixion and Resurrection. Small ambulatory windows to north and south are set in larger blind bays; those to the south have stained glass commemorating Jesuit saints, probably by Westlake. Three polygonal chapels open off the ambulatory at the east end, built in 1896 and dedicated to St Joseph, the Sacred Heart and Our Lady. Each has a vaulted stone roof with emblematic carved bosses. The outer chapels retain alabaster altar tables, each with a fine carved stone reredos. Each chapel has polychrome tile floors. The stained glass in each chapel is by Hardman and Westlake. Carved wooden benches remain in the Lady Chapel.

The sanctuary was reordered in 1990: the original parquet floor remains, but the high altar was remodelled. The reredos and tabernacle are in situ, the altar reduced but flanked by the stone bases of the former baldacchino. The rood screen by McCulloch of Kennington, from 1887, is in slender iron filigree; the design is based on the rood in the Collegiate church at Louvain, Belgium, and drawings of figures from the rood screen at Westminster Abbey. Against the pier of the south chancel arch is a Carrara marble figure of Our Lady from 1896 by Messrs Regali of London, beneath a richly carved canopy. Wrought iron altar rails by JF Bentley formerly enclosed the High Altar but were repositioned in 1990 to either side of the lower altar at the opening to the sanctuary.

Sacristies

Arched stone doorways with ornate foliate door furniture lead to inner and outer sacristies on the north side of the chancel. The sacristies are linked by a heavy oak panelled door. The outer sacristy has plain panelled cupboards. Above is a community tribune with a pierced timber oriel window overlooking the choir and an upper doorway.

Historical Context

The Church of the Sacred Heart is an exceptionally large and richly furnished parish church. It was founded in 1887 through the patronage of Edith Arendrup, a wealthy widow and member of the Courtauld family who was keen to support the Roman Catholic community in Wimbledon. Frederick Walters had recently completed the Church of St Joseph, Roehampton for the Jesuits and in 1884 was commissioned without competition to design the new church in Wimbledon.

The architect, Frederick Arthur Walters (1849-1931), was the son of Frederick Page Walters of Walbrook, also an architect. He established his own practice in 1880 after training as a pupil with his father and with the practice of Goldie and Child, a practice notable in mid and late 19th-century Catholic church building. Walters was responsible for many churches for the Roman Catholic community, from the small St Winefride's in south Wimbledon (1905) to the monastic buildings and church at Buckfast Abbey, Devon (1907-32). His work included the church of the Sacred Heart, Petworth, for which he built the church and presbytery in 1896, the church of St Mary, Cardiff (1907), and buildings for the Benedictine monastery at Douai, Berkshire and for the abbey church in Ealing, London (1897). He was one of several notable architects who worked on the abbey church at Downside. Towards the end of his career, in the 1920s, he built the cathedral church of St Peter, Winchester.

Significance

The Church of the Sacred Heart is of special architectural and historic interest as the most impressive Roman Catholic parish church by FA Walters, an architect noted for his ecclesiastical buildings. Built under generous patronage, it has details and fittings of exceptionally high quality, including those by JF Bentley, Hardman & Co and Westlake. Although the sanctuary has been reordered, this does not diminish the special interest of the building. Its scale and richness raise it above the more typical late 19th-century Roman Catholic parish church.