Church of St Mary the Virgin, Ewell

Church of St Mary the Virgin, Ewell

The parish church was rebuilt in 1847-1848 by architect Henry Clutton in the style of medieval architecture from around 1300 and the early 14th century. The west porch was added in 1908. A fire in 1973 primarily affected the north aisle and led to rebuilding work in this area, the main alteration being the insertion of a horizontal partition in the former north chapel.

The church is constructed of coursed, rock-faced limestone from Swanage (according to ICBS records) with red clay tile roofs. Following mid-19th century ecclesiological taste, the various parts of the church are placed under their own separate roofs, with the aisles and south vestry each having their own separate gables.

The plan comprises a nave, lower chancel, south aisle, wider north aisle, south and west porches, a tower positioned to the west of the north aisle, north chancel aisle, organ chamber, and south-east vestry.

The exterior features mainly two-light windows with cusped circles and trefoils in their heads. At the east end of the chancel is a five-light window with a spherical triangle in the head containing three smaller cusped triangles. The west end has a four-light Geometrical window. The tower, placed to the west of the north aisle, has three stages with two-light belfry windows and is crowned by an embattled parapet with tall corner pinnacles. There is no clerestory, but the nave has additional lighting provided by two three-light timber dormers on each side.

Inside, the nave and aisles are separated by arcades with alternating round and octagonal piers carrying double-chamfered arches. The south arcade has five bays and the north four, reflecting the tower's position at the extreme west end of the north aisle. The nave has an arch-braced roof, plastered between the rafters, with king-posts and curved struts above the collar; the aisle roofs are similar.

The screen between nave and chancel is a much-restored and altered late-medieval piece with brattished cresting to the pierced wainscot and one-light upper openings with ogee arches and florid tracery. A west gallery on timber posts runs across both nave and aisles, with a front featuring trefoil-headed arches.

The east end is distinguished by a large opus sectile (tiled) reredos of 1893 with a florid stone frame depicting the Last Supper, flanked by pairs of Evangelists. The late medieval font, of conventional octagonal design with quatrefoils on the bowl, survives from the previous church. The marble and alabaster pulpit is a florid polychromatic piece of 1897 with figures under trefoil-headed arches and a base of marble shafts. The square-ended Victorian pews are plain, whilst the stalls have shaped ends and open traceried frontals. Numerous monuments transferred from the old church are positioned at the east end of the aisles, in the chancel and under the tower. These include 16th-century brasses, but the most imposing monument is in the chancel: a white marble monument to Sir William Lewen (died 1721), showing him as a reclining figure in a wig, framed by Corinthian pilasters with an open segmental pediment and cherubs' heads emerging from cloth below. A large benefactions board dated 1849 is mounted on the north aisle's north wall.