Chapel Of The Former Convent Of St Peter

Private Chapel, 1898–1900, designed by J L Pearson and F L Pearson. Built in brick and stone with clay tile roofs.

The elevations display Early English character within a plan drawing inspiration from late Gothic and Early Christian sources. The building consists of eight bays along the north and south sides, with the two nave bays set under a lower roof. The east end is apsidal, with slightly smaller apses projecting from the side of the last bay on either side. Windows are chiefly paired lancets; those to the choir have plate tracery, while those to the apses are single lancets set within round-arched arcades. A corbel table runs over the choir, changing to a Lombard frieze at the last bay and apses. On the south side stands a two-storey vestry block with flat-arched windows and parapet, alongside a gabled staircase tower and bellcote. The north side features a side chapel flanking the choir under a separate roof, with an apsidal east end and interesting tracery in a shallow transept.

The interior of the main chapel begins with a vestibule divided from the nave by a three-bay arcade with corbelled stone gallery over. The nave comprises two bays with a massive Early English stone arcade carrying a timber roof with arched collars. Narrow aisles flank either side and continue alongside the choir. The floor rises approximately three feet between nave and choir. The choir extends four bays with a lighter arcade than the nave, supporting ribbed stone vaults that continue into the chancel for one bay before narrowing and adapting to the three apses. A late Gothic choir screen and stalls are present. A decorative geometric marble floor ornaments the choir and chancel. A gabled baldachino in marble and alabaster, designed by F L Pearson after the model of his father's work in Peterborough Cathedral, features red marble columns supporting gabled niches at each corner with nativity carvings in the tympana. The marble and alabaster altar is carved with New Testament scenes flanking Christ in Glory within a vesica. The reredos contains floral panels carved in low relief flanking a gabled niche. A statue of the Virgin Mary on an integral pedestal stands at the north chancel arch. Stained glass windows in the easternmost bays, the east ends of either aisle, and the three apses are almost entirely late 19th or early 20th century, along with a four-light stained glass window on the south side of the vestibule.

The north side chapel comprises four bays with a barrel-vaulted roof and retains only an altar in the chancel, with one stained glass window in the west wall and one in the north wall.

A crypt chapel extends five bays with vaulted construction and narrow side aisles, its plan 'lobed' at the east end as in the main chapel above. The chancel occupies the last bay, which with the apses is treated in Neo-Byzantine style to the designs of F L Pearson. Marble columns with spreading cushion capitals support marble wall panels of Neo-Byzantine ornament, with mosaic decoration above in the complex vaulting and deep window embrasures. Three stained glass windows light the north apse and two the south. A decorative marble floor ornaments the space. The altar is marble with an opus sectile-decorated front and a reredos of gilded and beaten metal enriched with enamels and coloured stones.

The chapel forms a group with the former convent of St Peter.