Reading Synagogue

Reading Synagogue, built in 1900 and designed by William G. Lewton of Reading for the Reading Hebrew Congregation, is a red brick building in English bond with Bath stone dressings, to which a 20th-century hall was added to the south side. The roof is slate with gabled ends, corbelled verges and eaves, and includes a brick axial stack.

The building has a rectangular plan with an entrance on the north side leading into a vestibule at the west end. A staircase rises from the vestibule to a ladies’ gallery and a committee room, while below is a covered-over mikvah. The architectural style is Moorish. The north front is two storeys and four bays, divided by pilasters with gablets to flat buttresses and a corbelled eaves cornice. It has two-light ground floor windows with stone lintels and cills, and three-light first-floor windows with horse-shoe arches and twisted colonnettes featuring carved capitals, imposts, and ramped cills. A portal in the right-hand bay features a brick corbelled pedimental gable with a stone oculus and a doorway with two orders of colonnettes, carved capitals, imposts, a large horse-shoe arch, a fanlight with cusps and stained glass, and panelled, glazed double doors. A fifth bay to the right has a lower hipped roof and a tripartite ground floor window with colonnettes. The west return has a similar window and gable, with a three-light stair window featuring horse-shoe arches. The east gable end has a circular window with cusps. The south elevation has three-light windows with brick horse-shoe arches. A fleche rises above the roof, featuring battered arcading and an onion-shaped cupola topped with a finial bearing the Star of David.

The interior is complete and intact, with a ladies’ gallery with a panelled front and brass rail supported on columns with console capitals, pews including those for the Chief Rabbi and minister, and an Ark with columns in antis. Above the Ark are the Commandments, framed by small colonnettes and horse-shoe arches. The bimmah has panelled and balustraded sides, candelabra on the corner posts, and scroll bearers. The lay reader, president and vice-president have a dedicated pew. Exposed roof trusses feature cusped brackets with pendants to the tie-beams and baluster posts to the collars. The vestibule at the west end contains a staircase to the ladies’ gallery and committee room. Stained glass windows are present, and the oculus at the east end displays a Star of David.