United Reform Church And Attached Wall

United Reform Church and attached wall, Teignmouth

A non-conformist church built in 1883 to the design of John Salman, with a school and church hall added in 1903. The building is constructed of squared grey Plymouth stone with cream freestone dressings and has a complex slate roof, some sections with crested detailing.

The church has a complex rectangular plan. The exterior is distinguished by leaded windows filled with coloured glass. The main front features a right-of-centre high coped gabled porch with a crocketed finial. The richly carved apex incorporates scrolls, a rose and a shield flanked by the dates 1790 and 1883. Below is a deeply moulded pointed arch with foliate moulding to an outer course, supported by four colonnettes with stiff-leaf moulding to the capitals. At the top of the steps are wrought-iron gates that roll back into the wall when opened. The double half-glazed entrance doors are set in the right-hand wall.

To the right of the porch stands an octagonal tower in four stages. The south-east facet has a defaced gabled stone plaque bearing the dates 1790 and Sept 28 188- (probably 2 or 3); above it is a tall empty niche with a swept stone roof and pendants. The third stage features lancets to each facet, and the top parapet has pierced square quatrefoil panels beneath a moulded cornice.

To the left of the porch is a large octagonal tower in two stages with a hipped roof and ornamented coved cornice. Engaged colonnettes to the angles are topped by freely carved foliate capitals. The upper stage displays wide pointed, almost semicircular arches with dog-tooth moulding to 3-light windows with circular windows to the apexes. The transomed lower windows, approximately 3 metres above ground, are paired; between them engaged colonnettes to the south-west and south-east facets rest on the high plinth and terminate on the aprons of the upper windows with lively carved griffins.

The left return on the west side comprises a series of canted bays, some with blocked windows. The west transept, seen above them, has a moulded stack rising to the apex of the gable and a circular window above paired pointed-arched windows.

The right return on the east side has a similar transept with offset buttresses to the rear end articulating two mullioned and transomed windows, which have deeply weathered sills. To the far right a taller gabled range with a quatrefoil window has a rectangular single-storey projecting bay, possibly of later date, with a hipped roof and a 3-light mullioned and transomed window.

To the right of the south-west corner tower is a stair range with lancet windows. The coped gable to the rear has two loop-holes to the apex above paired pointed-arched windows under a similar arch. To each side are buttresses, each with two gabled offsets projecting to the front of a single-storey lean-to flanked by 8-panelled doors glazed to the tops.

The 1903 schoolroom is attached to the north-west and has a separate hipped roof with elaborate terra-cotta finials. The north facade is articulated by pilasters gabled above the eaves. The gabled central bay has a 2-light window to the top above a gabled doorcase with a circular window over double doors set in a shouldered arch. Two and 3-light mullioned and transomed windows flank this bay on each side; those to the first floor have trefoil heads. The returns are canted bays.

The interior is unusually fine and well-articulated for a late nineteenth-century Gothic style non-conformist church, featuring deeply undercut capitals to arcades, an original rostrum and other original details. A triple arcade runs to the rear gallery. Original plans indicate a central rostrum with the organ behind, now moved to one side.

A projecting rock-faced wall approximately 1.5 metres high and 15 metres long connects the projecting bays at the north and south ends of the east side, stepping down toward the south.

The church was founded in 1790 and rebuilt in stone in 1883 at a cost of £3,700. It represents a very fine and imaginative example of a late nineteenth-century non-conformist church in the Gothic Revival style, built for a prosperous urban congregation. The design was modified slightly during construction, with larger traceried windows used in place of lancets, and the intended school may have been completed to a different plan.