Banbury Quaker Meeting House

Quaker Meeting House

This Quaker meeting house, dating from 1681 and 1749-1751 with 19th and 20th century alterations including work by architect H Godwin Arnold, stands in the north-west corner of the Quaker burial ground off Horse Fair in Banbury. It is built in coursed Hornton stone with red brick laid to English bond, and has Stonesfield Slate roof coverings.

The building comprises an east-west oriented rectangular main meeting house linked by a north-south corridor to the former women's business room, also rectangular and east-west oriented. A group of 19th century ancillary buildings are massed to the north wall of the main meeting house and the eastern wall of the former women's business room. The burial ground and buildings are enclosed to the south by a Grade II-listed boundary wall, largely obscuring them from the street.

The single-storey, full-height main meeting house has a hipped roof and displays a shallow plinth with a plain string course between ground and first floors. The south front is arranged in three bays with three two-over-two sash windows to both ground floor and upper level, lighting the main meeting room. Each straight-headed window opening includes a dropped keystone and a stone sill. A date-stone reading 1751 appears between the first and second bays at upper level. A Tuscan porch standing perpendicularly to the south-west corner provides the main entrance, leading into the western corridor range. The porch doorway includes a four-panel door flanked by partially-glazed sidelights with a rectangular fanlight.

The west elevation comprises a single-storey lean-to corridor range in red brick laid to English bond, lit by one window and featuring a doorway opening into the burial ground. The other elevations of the main meeting house are largely obscured by attached and neighbouring buildings.

The single-storey former women's business room, reported to include some original fabric from 1681, is built in a mix of masonry and brickwork with a hipped roof. It is lit by three window openings to the south elevation and two higher window openings to the north. The ancillary buildings have shed roofs.

Internally, the western corridor range features tongue and groove panelling and a set of 19th century coat hooks. The main meeting room, entered through a centrally-placed doorway from the corridor range, is full-height with a dado of vertical tongue and groove panelling ramped up at the eastern end where the Elders' Stand is positioned. The plastered ceiling includes timber beading. A staircase to the western gallery is positioned in the south-west corner, accessed from the corridor range. The gallery, carried on two posts, has a panelled front. The former women's business room also has a dado of vertical tongue and groove panelling and includes notable furniture including an 18th century long-case clock by John Gilkes of Shipston-on-Stour, gifted to the Meeting in 2011.