Holy Trinity Church

Church built 1963-4 by Arthur Bailey, with consulting engineers Messrs Redpath Brown.

Materials and Construction

The walls are built of irregular yellow London stock bricks laid in English bond. The zinc-coated steel roof structure is covered in cedar shingles and lined internally with acoustic tiles. The windows are clear plate glass. The building is heated through an underground system of copper pipework.

Plan

The church has a square plan with corners aligning broadly with compass points. An enclosed entrance porch protrudes from the north-west elevation, and a splayed rectangular wing extends from the south-west elevation housing the vestry, choir vestry, toilets and boiler room. The nave is aligned along a diagonal east-west axis with the altar to the east.

Exterior

The building comprises a single-storey brick base supporting a large pyramidal roof approximately 70 feet in height. The roof height is dropped to the west along the diagonal north-south axis, with glazing between the east and west halves of the roof. This glazing is divided into narrow vertical strips of irregular width. The apex of the east half of the roof is canted and oversails the west half; the underside is lined with timber and roof steels emerge through the glazing, displaying the supporting structure. An electrically operated bell hangs from the centre of the apex.

The walls are of irregular depth with multi-faceted buttresses to each corner. Irregularly sized windows are positioned in the central section of each elevation and are deeply set between buttresses of varying height, width and depth. One of the windows in the north-west elevation has been converted into a door to allow wheelchair access.

A flat-roofed entrance porch extends to the north-west with hardwood glazed entrance doors. To the left of the doors is a white wooden cross and foundation stone which reads:

THIS STONE WAS LAID ON 18TH JUNE 1963 / BY VICE ADMIRAL I. W. T. BELOE CB. DSC. RN. / AND DEDICATED TO THE GLORY OF GOD / BY DAVID 140TH BISHOP OF ROCHESTER

A narrow flat-roofed wing extends to the south-west. The north-east elevation is glazed to the north and blind to the south; the south-west and south-east elevations are of brick with windows set into shallow bays.

Interior

The interior walls are untreated flush-finished brickwork and the steel roof structure is fully exposed, with the feet of the principal steels embedded into the four corners of the building and the secondary steels resting on a concrete ring beam above the wall head. The acoustic tiles lining the ceiling are arranged in yellow and white stripes.

The worship area is open and uninterrupted. The high-level glazing directs natural light onto the sanctuary, which sits between the east corner and centre point of the building. The clear-glazed windows set between the deep buttresses allow controlled and directional daylight into the building. The rows of fixed pews are angled, partially wrapping around the sanctuary to create a fan-like congregational space. Three choir stalls sit within the fan-shape to the south of the nave, distinguished from the pews only by music rests which protrude from the back of the stall in front.

The altar serves both the main congregation to the west and a 'chapel' in the east corner. The chapel is demarcated with a carpeted floor and prayer book rests; the pews have been removed. The font is located to the left of the nave, between the altar and the congregation.

The interiors of the south-west wing, which houses the vestry and choir vestry, are not of special architectural interest.

Fixtures and Fittings

The altar is T-shaped in elevation with a floating hardwood top on a polygonal platform surrounded by a steel and hardwood altar rail. The font is egg-shaped with a hardwood cover. The hardwood pews and choir stalls are fitted with ten built-in standard lamps with black tubular stands and black cylindrical shades spread amongst the congregational space. There are clergy seats, a lectern, a pulpit and a large cross above the altar, all in hardwood. The pipe organ (with pipes suspended behind the hardwood cross) was built in 1975 by Browne's of Canterbury from a redundant organ at Hever Church in Kent.

The altar and font were cast in situ from a mix which included fine granite chippings, producing a rough-textured white finish. The hardwood furnishings are of utile. With the exception of the organ, the fixtures and fittings were designed by the architect.

History

Arthur Bailey (1903-1979), at this time working in partnership with William Henry Ansell (1873-1959), was appointed to build Holy Trinity Church for the post-war suburb of Twydall under the Rochester Diocesan Scheme for Church Extension. The church was in the early phases of design by spring 1962, the foundation stone was laid in June 1963, and the new church was consecrated in September 1964. The church cost over £47,000, more than £17,000 of which was raised by the parish itself.

Bailey was one of a number of talented architects who trained under E Vincent Harris (1876-1971), renowned for his solid neo-classical works. Bailey undertook a wide variety of commissions during his career and in partnership with Ansell played a central role in the restoration of London's blitzed churches, including the dramatic modern insertion into Hawksmoor's St George in the East (re-consecrated in 1964). Bailey also designed a number of new churches, the best known being the Dutch Church, Austin Friars, London, built 1950-54 (listed at Grade II).

Bailey's earlier churches were traditional in form and historical in style; however by 1960 his work had moved towards a more modern approach. An early example of this is seen in his entry for the competition to design Liverpool's Roman Catholic Cathedral, for which he won third place in 1960. His design was a radical departure from the refined classicism and conventional layout of the Dutch Church. This change of direction would have been strongly influenced by the ideas of the Liturgical Movement.

The Liturgical Movement had its origins in pre-First World War Belgium, in progressive Catholic theological circles. A return to Biblical sources and a deepening understanding of the worship of the Early Church promoted a new concept of liturgy, in which laity and clergy joined in active participation, with the Eucharist at the heart of a corporate act of worship. These ideas became widely disseminated in Europe during the inter-war period. British architects were not at the forefront of these new ideas; with a few notable exceptions, it was not until the post-war period that church building in England truly began to reflect the influence of the Liturgical Movement and embrace the experimentation with church form that began with Frank Lloyd Wright's Unitarian Church, Wisconsin (1947-52) and was developed in northern Europe. Innovative church building was dominated by the unified worship space, and in particular by the exploration of plan forms that placed the Eucharist literally as well as spiritually at the centre of the worship. Churches became shorter and broader and the main altar was brought forward so that the celebrant could face the congregation, whilst the positioning of the font and the choir became a cause for much experimentation.

The layout of Holy Trinity embraces the ideas of the Liturgical Movement: the fan-shaped arrangement of pews and the chapel to the east gives the altar a near three-hundred-and-sixty-degree relationship with the congregational space. The font is brought close to the altar and lectern, drawing together the elements of Christian worship. The choir is brought amongst, and is almost indistinguishable from, the congregation. The single-height walls and low windows keep the interior on a human scale, whilst the soaring roof space gives dramatic height and space above.

Although working to a tight budget, Bailey applied a striking level of ambition to his commission for Holy Trinity. He worked honestly and creatively with modest materials rather than compromise on the totality of the scheme. Bailey produced an internal layout that responded to the new ideas in church planning, which at this date were only being explored by the most innovative British church architects. Externally, his creative use of form and texture result in a building that is expressive of its time and place, but also of the ideas of continuity and tradition.

Significance

Holy Trinity Church is designated at Grade II for its architectural interest in the creative use of traditional materials and bold modern forms, creating a dramatic and expressive response to the concepts of modernity and continuity in the English parish church. The building is almost completely unaltered; the near-complete survival of the liturgical furniture, fixtures and fittings designed by the architect is particularly noteworthy. The internal arrangement of the church displays an early response to the ideas of the Liturgical Movement which became a dominant force in post-war church planning from the 1960s onwards.