Church Of St John The Evangelist

Church of St John the Evangelist

The Church of St John the Evangelist is a large Late Victorian town church built between 1893 and 1895 to the designs of J. Oldrid Scott and C.T. Miles of Bournemouth. A distinctive north-west porch-tower was added in 1919-20, possibly also by Scott and Miles, and the west end was internally reordered in 1989-90.

The church is constructed of flint with banding of Castle Cary stone and Bath stone dressings, beneath red tiled roofs. It comprises a five-bay nave with full-length aisles, a two-bay chancel, and short transepts to north and south. The east end of the south aisle broadens to form a chapel. Vestries occupy the south transept and a low range beyond it. A church hall and day centre from the 1990s runs along the south side but is not of special interest.

Built in a rich Decorated style, the church is crowned by a shingled fleche on the ridge. The west end features a six-light window with inventive tracery set within a large relieving arch between two coped buttresses. A traceried oculus appears in the west gable above a shallow projecting porch with a blind trefoil in its gable. The north-west porch of 1919-20, costing £4,896, stands on the site of an intended tower. This porch is oddly detailed, with complex roof lines featuring raised corners fronted by pinnacles and a gabled attic tier above. A narrow square bell-turret rises in the re-entrant angle to the west, with rectangular belfry lights containing wayward tracery and a pyramid roof.

The aisles are buttressed and topped with solid parapets displaying flint and stone chequerwork with gabled copings. The north aisle has two-light windows, whilst the south side features four-light windows in the aisle and three-light windows in the chapel, all with varied Decorated tracery. The chequerwork parapet of the aisle continues around the chapel. The south transept is largely concealed by the gabled vestry positioned in front of it, parallel to the chancel. The east end presents an impressive five-light Geometric window with mullions continued below to form a band of blind panelling. Prominent coped gables surround the east end, and several gables, including that of the chancel, display chequerwork in the apex. The windows in the north and south walls of the chancel and in the east end of the vestry contain rich curvilinear tracery. The north-east transept has paired windows in its gable separated by a substantial buttress. There is an unusual reversal of visual emphasis, with the transepts being fairly low and shallow whilst the south-east vestry and north-west porch are developed as large transept-like volumes.

The interior is impressive and spacious, lined throughout with cream ashlar. Over the chancel arch, and in the east and west walls and upper nave, are banding and chequerwork in cream, pale grey and darker grey stones, echoing the exterior treatment. The nave arcade, the two-bay south transept and openings off the chancel feature quatrefoil columns of pink Dumfries stone banded with Blue Lias, topped with foliage capitals. The arcades have moulded arches rising from stilted vertical sections over the capitals. In the bottom of the spandrels between the nave arches appear quirky cusped dagger motifs, a motif the architects later used at All Saints, West Southbourne. The roof is particularly impressive, raised on wall shafts with foliage corbels and constructed in two tiers of trefoil section with canted rafters rising to collar beams, then a second stage forming a tunnel in the roof ridge. The chancel roof is similar but with more prominent arch-braces. Inner arches on colonnettes appear between the north aisle windows. The transept at the east end of the north aisle is arranged as a Second World War memorial chapel with a double arch opening into the chancel. The transeptal organ chamber to the south has a very high arcaded opening. At the chancel arch there is no screen, only a very low and short breast wall either side of semicircular steps opening out towards the nave; these features express Low Church liturgical ideals. The west end of the nave was divided off by Maurice Taylor in 1989-90 through insertion of a free-standing structure with concrete columns and unostentatious timber and glass partitions forming a foyer and offices, avoiding any disruption to the aisle windows.

The east wall is entirely covered by the reredos. Its base has linenfold panels, whilst the centre above rises higher with a gilded and painted frame and ornate cresting. The centre panel is a fabric panel, a Low Church design avoiding figurative carving or religious symbolism. The outer panels display painted and gilded texts (Creed, Commandments, etc.) beneath a traceried frieze. Simple altar rails with wrought-iron standards are present. The twelve-sided oak pulpit was made by the firm of Harry Hems, Exeter, and features pierced Gothic panels with elaborate carving. Its base is ribbed in the manner of a fountain vault, on a clustered shaft of grey marble. The octagonal font is of white stone with quatrefoil panels in the bowl and a thick moulded stem with panels of cusped arches. The chancel and sanctuary floors are of black and white marble chequerwork with figured marble steps. The vividly coloured east window is by Percy Bacon, 1902. Also by him are several windows in the chancel and south aisle dating from around 1910-25, the west window, the rose above it, and the porch window, these being more muted in tone. In the north aisle are two windows by Hugh Powell from 1961 and one reportedly by Caroline Townshend from 1934. Upholstered chairs replaced the original seating around 1990.

St John is situated in the busy centre of Boscombe among the Late Victorian and Edwardian shops of Christchurch Road. Lavish hotels, shopping arcades and a theatre were all built nearby around 1890-5. The growth of Boscombe from the 1870s offered fertile ground for new church building. Bournemouth in the late 19th century was dominated in religious terms by the High Anglican churches stemming from the work of the Reverend Alexander Morden Bennett of St Peter. The Low or Evangelical wing of the Church of England responded first with Holy Trinity in 1868 (demolished), then with the daughter churches of St Andrew Malmesbury Park and St John Boscombe in the 1890s. The contractors were Jenkins & Sons of Christchurch, and the cost was £16,172. A parish of St John was formed in 1890 from St Clement. The present church was preceded by a temporary building opened in 1891.

The working partnership (never a full business partnership) of John Oldrid Scott with the local architect Charles Thomas Miles began at St John. They also designed St Andrew, Florence Road, Boscombe in 1907-8, and All Saints, Southbourne in 1913-14. After Miles's death, his son assisted C.M.O. Scott in the design of St Christopher, Southbourne, built 1932-4. J. Oldrid Scott (1841-1913) was the son of the great Victorian architect Sir George Gilbert Scott and younger brother of George Gilbert Scott junior. He began practice in 1863 in London and specialised in church work. C.T. Miles (1852-1930) was the son of a Bournemouth builder. He was articled to the architect Dugald McPhail of Shaftesbury from 1864 to 1867, worked in the offices of Parken & Creeke from 1867 to 1869, then with his father from 1869 to 1872. He became an assistant to A.H. Parken in 1872 and set up on his own in 1875. He became a Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects in 1895 and worked in partnership with his son S.C. Miles (born 1877) from 1909.