Parish Church Of Saint James

The Parish Church of Saint James is an Anglican church built around 1880 for the 3rd Earl of Eldon, designed by G.E. Street. It is constructed of ashlar stone with a chamfered plinth and moulded round apse, featuring a string course under the window cills and stone slate roofs with coped gables. The church is in the 13th-century Gothic style, exhibiting French influence.

The church consists of a nave with north and south aisles of four bays, a clerestory, a crossing with a central tower, north and south transepts, a vestry east of the north transept, and an apsidal sanctuary, with a west narthex. The tower, rising two stages above the roofline, has a moulded parapet with stepped coping and a cornice decorated with wide billet ornament. The belfry features a triple arcade on each face, with the two outer arches blank and the central arch containing a louvred window. Buttresses mark the lower stage of the tower, while circular shafts accentuate the belfry. String courses define each stage. The ringing chamber has a trefoil-headed lancet on each face. The west gable wall has shallow buttresses and a large rose window. The narthex, below the rose window, has a lean-to roof and a glazed open arcade of seven bays with pointed arches on circular columns, with doorways at each end. The west walls of the aisles have single lancets. The nave's clerestory contains four pairs of lancets separated by shallow buttresses, and the aisles have similar lancets separated by gabled buttresses. A circular stair turret with a conical cap and surface moulding in a lattice pattern is situated east of the north transept. The vestry, east of the turret, has twin gables on each face with lancets at two levels. The apsidal sanctuary has lancets separated by gabled buttresses. A single lancet is found in the east wall of the south transept and a triple lancet in a sunk panel with a pointed arch and hoodmould in the south wall; a circular window with quatrefoil tracery is in the west wall.

Internally, the nave has a pointed waggon-type roof with exposed rafters and wind-bracing. Simple timber lean-to aisle roofs are present. Quadripartite vaults cover the crossing and transepts, while the sanctuary has a sexpartite vault. The nave arcade features Pubeck marble piers with attached shafts, stiff-leaf capitals, and moulded arches with a dog-tooth ornament. The crossing arches have similar details with moulded capitals. Rere-arches to windows incorporate Purbeck marble shafts. The sanctuary contains sedilia and a piscina, and is finished with an encaustic tile floor. Stained glass is by Clayton and Bell. Wrought iron chancel and parclose screens, a wrought iron pulpit on a stone base, and a stone font of quatrefoil shape with a Purbeck marble base, all designed by Street, are also present. The main west door has fine ironwork, flanked by two smaller openings from the narthex. In the sanctuary are two marble monuments by Chantry to the 1st Earl and Countess of Eldon, dated 1832 and 1831, which were moved from the Old Church. Two simpler tablets, also from the Old Church and commemorating the 2nd Earl and his daughter, are located in the south transept, dated 1854 and 1864. The church is described as an outstanding and unspoiled example of Gothic Revival architecture.