Church Of St Joseph And Attached Steps And Walls

BRIGHTON

TQ3105SE ELM GROVE 577-1/28/279 (North side) 19/07/85 Church of St Joseph and attached steps and walls (Formerly Listed as: ELM GROVE St Joseph's Roman Catholic Church)

II*

Roman Catholic church. 1880-1906. The original design, by W Kedo Broder, was for a church with a polygonal chancel flanked by outer apsidal chapels, nave, transepts, and a tall west tower and spire. The nave and chancel were completed by 1880 to this design; the south transept and chapel were opened in 1885 to the design of JS Hansom; the west front, designed by FA Walters, was completed by 190l, and the north transept and north chapel by 1906. Kentish rag with Bath stone dressings, roof of slate. PLAN: chancel, side chapel, shallow transepts, nave. EXTERIOR: the east end has an apse of 5 sides with windows of 2 lights with trefoiled tracery, and gabled buttresses between; south-east and north-east chapels are 5 sides of an octagon with similar windows under hoodmoulds, buttresses with one offset. Shallow transepts with 2 windows of 2 lights with sexfoil above under hoodmoulds, and gabled buttresses with one offset to either side, 3 stepped lancets in the gable. Single-storey vestry to north-east side. 2-bay nave with low unwindowed aisles under a lean-to roof; clerestory has 3-light windows with trefoiled tracery and 2 gabled buttresses with one offset. The west end has a gabled porch, the flat-arched entrance set under a pointed arch with the mouldings of the archivolt dying into splayed reveals; the double doors have elaborate hinges and there is a statue of St Joseph in the tympanum; 2 pointed-arched windows above, each of 2 lights with a cinquefoil above and under a single hoodmould with a vesica-shaped window in the spandrel; 3 stepped lancets to gable, also under a single hoodmould; stair tower to left of porch, square in plan; buttress to right. Steps up to west porch in 2 flights, with flanking walls crowned by a spiked rail. INTERIOR: apsidal chancel of 7 bays with vault-shafts of Bath stone, vaulting of white Beere brick; multi-shafted chancel arch combined with 2-bay arcade to transepts, the columns to the south with foliage caps, those to the north uncarved; slim columns to transepts with foliage capitals and sexpartite vault to crossing; nave of 2 major bays relating to the vaulting of the roof, of stone and brick as in the chancel, and 4 subsidiary bays relating to the arcade to passage-aisles, which consists of circular columns carrying abaci only. Organ gallery to west end.

Listing NGR: TQ3192605284