Church Of St Mary

Parish Church. Built between 1849 and 1851 by Decimus Burton. The church comprises a west tower and spire, a nave, a chancel, and a north vestry. The walls are of dressed stone, with Ham stone windows and strings, and gable copings. The roofs are covered with clay tiles.

The three-stage west tower features set-back buttresses with set-offs, and a semi-octagonal newel stair at the northwest corner. The external door has a pointed head and chamfered jambs. The second stage has a chamfered lancet window with a label and run-out stops on the west face. The third stage incorporates a two-light window with trefoil cusping and a falchion above, and a stopped label. A Ham stone corbel table with trefoil cusping runs along the top of the tower, with grotesques at the corners. The octagonal broach spire has two sets of gabled lucarnes and a fleuron finial.

The five-bay nave has buttresses between single lancets with trefoil-cusped heads. The two-bay chancel has set-back buttresses and two-light windows, also trefoil-cusped with an ogee quatrefoil above, with returned labels. The east window is formed of three stepped lancets, incorporating Purbeck marble shafts and foliage capitals, with a label and head-stops above. The south porch has gable copings with a cross above, and moulded kneelers. The entrance has nook shafts, capitals and bases with a roll-moulded arch. A keeled roll label has fleuron stops. The inner doorway has a pointed arch, nook shafts with imposts, and a C19 plank door with strap hinges.

The north vestry has a pentice tile roof, and a pointed-arch doorway with a plank door and strap hinges.

Inside, the chancel arch is pointed, with two orders of responds with round foliage capitals, and wave moulding between. The roof is arch-braced and carried on scalloped stone corbels. The stone pulpit is three-sided, with trefoil-cusped panels, nook shafts, labels over and stopped details. The mid-19th century font is circular, with a round stem and a battered base. Stained glass in the east window, given by New College, Oxford in 1850, depicts Christ in a Mandorla held by angels, with a lamb above. Early 13th century fragments, largely imitations from the 19th century, are present. A north window in the chancel depicts the Coronation of the Virgin and Annunciation, dating to the 15th century, with some renewals.