Parish Church Of St Barnabas

The Parish Church of St Barnabas, designed by J E K and J P Cutts, was built between 1887 and 1889 on Stanley Road, Tunbridge Wells. Constructed of red brick laid in English bond with stone dressings and clay tile roofs, it stands as a grand-scale example of the Early English Gothic Revival style.

The church comprises a five-bay nave, three-bay chancel, north and south aisles, south chapel, south porch, south vestries, north organ chamber, and parish rooms attached to the north side. The architectural design draws all its motifs from the 13th century, evident in the three grouped lancets to each bay of the tall clerestory, smaller lancets to the lean-to aisles, and Geometrical-style windows in the east and west walls. The east window features a pair of two-light windows, each with a sexfoil opening in the head, surmounted by a large foiled mandorla. The west window has a 1-2-1 configuration, with the central pair of lights containing a foiled circle in the head, mirroring those at the east end. The south chapel sits under its own gabled roof, while a large porch under a transverse gable stands at the south-west corner. The junction between nave and chancel is marked by the base of a former fleche, removed in 1992. A small turret with an openwork stone top and pyramidal cap rises on the south side at the nave-chancel junction. The vestry block, positioned south of the chapel, lies under a flat roof.

Inside, the church displays even greater embellishment than the exterior, continuing the use of red brick with judicious stone dressings. The nave is long and wide, with five-bay arcades featuring octagonal piers, moulded capitals and bases, and arches carrying multiple mouldings. A very tall arch, nearly as wide as the nave itself, separates the nave from the chancel. This arch has a moulded head and banding on the trefoiled responds. The chancel receives richer architectural treatment than the nave. The plain lancets of the nave clerestory, though separated by shafts, give way in the chancel to large two-light windows with sexfoils in the heads (similar to the pairs in the east wall), complete with nook shafts. The chancel arcades feature circular rather than octagonal piers, with capitals bearing foliage carving. On the north side, the arcades continue as a blind arch with cusped Y-tracery into the sanctuary, where the walls are canted at 45 degrees in the corners and each contains a further blind traceried arch. The main nave roof trusses have tie-beams and arch braces forming scissors below a collar. In the chancel, the roof trusses have arch braces to a collar and a longitudinal runner. The organ pipes are mounted at first-floor level under two arches on the north side of the chancel. The floors include red and black tiling in the alleys of the nave and aisles, patterned tiling in the choir and sanctuary, and a wood-block floor to the south chapel. Beneath the east end lies a vaulted mortuary chapel with a stone altar and a single central column with a foliage capital.

St Barnabas was from the outset used for Anglo-Catholic worship, a tradition maintained to the present day, which accounts for the building's elaborate fittings spanning successive dates. The iron rood screen is original to the 1880s church, of considerable refinement, designed by the Cutts brothers and made by Singer of Frome, with carved figures executed by Harry Hems of Exeter. The pulpit is a very rich alabaster piece with open traceried sides, alabaster steps, and an alabaster and marble base. The font has a square, slightly tapering bowl of polished marble standing on a sturdy base with a central drum and octagonal corner piers, set on a polished marble step. The baldacchino covering the font is the work of Milner and Craze, dating from 1952. Milner and Craze were also responsible for the high altar reredos made in 1947, incorporating a crucified Christ carved in 1931 by Oscar Zwink. The high altar itself follows the designs of the Cutts brothers and has painted panels of angels adoring the Agnus Dei. The north (Lady) chapel was fitted out as a First World War memorial under G H Fellowes Prynne but was largely refitted in 1945 by Martin Travers, whose reredos with figures of the Doctors of the Church and tester now stand above the altar. Travers also designed the reredos in the south (St Stephen's) chapel. Around 1930, improvements were made under A J N Russell, including modifications to the choir stalls. His most remarkable achievement is the lectern of 1928 in brown and pink marble in Art Deco style, consisting of rectangular panels and a very linear design. The east and west windows are filled with stained glass by Heaton, Butler and Bayne to designs by the Cutts brothers.

St Barnabas is exceptional among the churches of Tunbridge Wells for its Anglo-Catholic tradition, which explains both the origins of the building and its present-day furnishings. It was one of many Anglo-Catholic missions to the poor in urban Victorian England. The area where the church was established was a poor one. In 1870, the Reverend Harry W Hitchcock, a wealthy young priest, moved to the area with his wife, offering to build a mission church at his own expense and to serve it on an unpaid basis. On the present site of St Barnabas, he acquired part of an old quarry which had become used as a municipal rubbish dump and built a small church dedicated to St Stephen. In due course, Hitchcock had his licence revoked for his unrepentant ritual practices, but the church continued. The parish of St Barnabas was established in 1881 and the church was twice extended before being taken down to make way for the present building. The social purpose of the St Barnabas project is clearly seen in the provision of a mortuary chapel in the new church, intended to allow the laying out of the deceased poor in a suitably solemn and holy setting.

The foundation stone was laid on 11 May 1887 and the new church was consecrated in 1889. The cost was £15,000, but an ambitious projected south-west steeple never progressed beyond what is now the porch. The church is built on an ambitious scale and, typical of late Victorian churches where funds were relatively limited for the grand purpose intended, St Barnabas is built of red brick with relatively modest amounts of freestone. The building is splendidly proportioned with an exceptionally fine, spacious interior and a particularly good collection of fixtures, some dating back to the building of the church while others show the continuing tradition of High Church embellishment extending into the post-war period.

John Edward Knight Cutts (1847-1938) was articled to the well-known and prolific church architect Ewan Christian from 1865 to 1870, after which he set up in independent practice. His younger brother, John Priston (1854-1935), was articled to him in 1877, remained as an assistant, and became a partner in about 1890. Cutts senior was diocesan surveyor for St Albans from 1881 to 1887. The firm developed a busy church architecture practice in and around London and specialised in generously proportioned economical buildings, typically of red brick in the Early English style, to meet the great demand for new churches in the area at the end of the 19th century. St Barnabas is a particularly fine example of their work, especially as many of their churches in London have been radically altered in recent decades.