Chapel Of St Josephs Convent

The Chapel of St Joseph's Convent is a chapel dating from 1892, designed by Charles Alban Buckler. It was built to the rear of No.4 Bristol Road. The building is constructed of brick with stone dressings and window tracery. It has gable ends featuring kneelers and coping, and gable crosses. The rectangular plan is oriented on a ritual east-west axis, running north-south, and comprises a chancel and nave covered by a roof of five bays. It is built in a Gothic Revival style.

The interior of the chapel has undergone extensive restoration work. Lower sections of the walls have been removed, and pointed-arch niches flanking the former altar have been taken away. The altar itself has been relocated to the upper reaches of the ritual west wall. Each roof truss features paired rafters shaped to resemble a pointed diaphragm arch, springing from plain corbels; an anthemion and palmette cornice forms a springing band for the boarded, pointed barrel vault, which may be copied from the staircase hall of No.4. A gallery occupies the upper level of the west end, potentially a former visitors' gallery. The eastern wall has a triple window, with each light featuring a trefoiled head and three trefoils above. Single windows are present in each bay of the ritual south wall: these are double-light windows, each light trefoiled with a trefoil roundel in the head, and linked by a sill band. Similar windows are located in the ritual north wall to the first three bays from the ritual east, with a segmental, pointed-arch window in the fifth bay. Stained glass is by Hardman. The original altar has been removed, and the reredos has been reattached to the upper reaches of the west wall. This is made of plaster and alabaster and carved with quatrefoils; the sides depict praying angels, and the centre shows the Blessed Virgin Mary and Christ with the body of a dying man. An inscription on the reredos commemorates JE Windham and his family. The statues of St Mary and St Joseph, which previously flanked the altar, are no longer present. The sexfoil-shaped piscina shelf is currently not visible, and may be covered over. The narthex is formed from the front parlour of No.4 Bristol Road and is included in the listing for that building.

The chapel was originally built for the Sisters of Mercy, who founded their convent in June 1852 at Egremont Place. The convent subsequently moved to a house opposite the church and then to Bristol Lodge in 1858. A cell block and refectory, also designed by Buckler, were added in 1864-66 and demolished around 1990.