Church Of St John The Divine

Church of St John the Divine

Parish church on Ripley Road, begun in 1936-37 and completed in 1966. Designed by the eminent church architect Nugent Francis Cachemaille-Day, the building incorporates and extends a Mission Church which opened in 1901, was extended with a chancel in 1923, and a vestry in 1931. The new church was built to accommodate 400-500 people, with the main body and lower stage of the tower completed for consecration in 1937, but the upper tower stages and spire not constructed until 1966.

The church is built of knapped flint and stone-coloured facing brick with brown tile roofs and a shingled spire, reflecting local traditional Sussex materials and forms. The plan comprises a broad five-bay nave extending into a chancel with shallow sanctuary, flanked by north and south aisles under separate pitched roofs. The eastern end of the south aisle incorporates the original Mission Church and functions as the Lady Chapel. The main entrance is a north porch approached by three semicircular steps, with a secondary entrance on the south aisle leading to a glazed lobby added in 1990.

The exterior displays the characteristic style of Cachemaille-Day's inter-war practice. The aisles sit under separate roofs with inner eaves below the nave clerestorey level and outer eaves sweeping low over the aisle windows. Aisle windows are grouped in three lights with metal-framed casements containing rectangular leaded lights; the five-light nave west window is set under a shallow segmental arch of coursed brick. The nave gable ends feature square openings with facetted daggers at the cardinal points and tracery reflecting this arrangement, each topped with a simple cross. Two-light clerestorey windows sit barely visible behind the aisle roofs. The north porch is faced in brick with a flint gable and flint chequerwork panels, its entrance doors set under a coursed brick segmental arch with narrow vertical glazed lights and rounded arrises echoing the window treatment. The three-stage tower is brick-faced with a change in colour marking the post-war upper stages. The lower stage's northern face features chequerwork flint and brick, while the eastern face is rendered. A teak statue of St John, designed and executed by John Lawson, is positioned at the north-west angle beneath a semicircular canopy. The north elevation's centrepiece is set back with spanning windows and a clock face fixed to the bell chamber louvres, a design more complex than Cachemaille-Day's original scheme but present by 1937.

The interior is light and spacious, laid out for Anglo-Catholic worship without the longitudinal divisions historically associated with that tradition. The five-bay nave and chancel flow continuously with arcades of rectangular chamfered piers supporting facetted shafts rising to clerestorey level, each supporting the wall post of a crown post roof. The arcades have very flat segmental arches with simple chamfers; a similar broad shallow arch separates the chancel from the Lady Chapel. The aisles have low flat ceilings set above eaves height on their outer sides. Internal surfaces are rendered except for the east wall, which is exposed brick set back under a broad-moulded brick segmental arch marking the Sanctuary. The Sanctuary's flanking walls are curved and set with an oak credence table in front of a stone piscina and aumbry with oak door. Above the altar, moved forward from the rear wall, stand carved wooden figures of Christ flanked by St John (north) and Richard of Chichester, patron saint of the diocese (south), designed by Christopher Webb and executed by Jethro Harris of Oxford. Both figures and the Stations of the Cross lining the nave have been repainted. The figures stand in alcoves with shallow segmental arches of receding brick courses. The altar rail, pulpit, choir seating and front nave rows are oak with raised and fielded panels; clergy seats have curved backs suggesting medieval choir stalls. The font at the nave's west end has a plain octagonal bowl on a square stem set on a grey stone base. Church fittings including sanctuary lamp, altar cross and candlesticks were designed by Cachemaille-Day. An organ was installed in 1991, replacing the original which was itself replaced in 1972. The adjacent church hall was built in 1961, replacing a temporary hut. The vestry, added to the Mission Church in 1931, was converted to a Meeting Room in 1991.

Nugent Francis Cachemaille-Day FRIBA (1896-1976) was an eminent and prolific church architect whose career straddled the Second World War. He was chief assistant to Henry Stuart Goodhart-Rendel, later President of the RIBA, before forming a partnership with Felix Lander and Herbert Welch. He established independent practice in 1935. His notable works include the churches of St Nicholas, Burnage, Manchester (Grade II); St Barnabas, Gloucester (Grade II); and the Church of the Epiphany, Leeds (Grade I).