Church Of All Saints

Church of All Saints, Merton

Parish church, substantially a Perpendicular rebuilding of the 15th century, though containing evidence of much earlier origins. The church was restored in 1875 by Medley Fulford, with screens and fittings executed by Harry Hems. The rubble walls of the north aisle are constructed of small squared blocks, and the roof is of slate with a gable end. The plan comprises a nave, north aisle, south transept, west tower and south porch.

The Norman font bears witness to the church's early medieval foundation, but the building is fundamentally Perpendicular in character. A discrepancy in the stonework between the aisle and nave suggests these sections may have been built at different periods. The south porch was noted as "modern" in the mid-19th century and was probably built or rebuilt around 1840. The 1875 restoration included renewing the roofs over the chancel and transept, replacing the fittings and probably constructing the vestry onto the east end of the north chapel.

Exterior features include a tall three-stage west tower with set back buttresses, crenellations and obelisk pinnacles. The belfry lights are two-light mullioned and transomed cinquefoiled openings, with an unusual eastern example consisting of two small cusped lights below a larger opening with circles in squares to either side. A stairway runs up the north tower wall, lit by very small quatrefoils. A very large four-light window in the 19th-century Decorated style appears on the west front. The west doorway is a heavily moulded 15th-century two-centred arch with arched hoodmould.

The north aisle windows are all restorations: the western one is in the Decorated style, while the others are square-headed with 14th-century style tracery. Between the left-hand and central windows stands a projecting 19th-century rubble lateral chimney stack with cylindrical shaft. The east end of the aisle bears a 19th-century gabled vestry with a small two-centred doorway on its west wall and a gable end chimney stack; this vestry blocks a window on the north face of the aisle, leaving the hoodmould partially visible. The north aisle extends to the east end of the chancel; both have 19th-century Perpendicular style four-light windows.

On the south side, the chancel projects slightly from the nave. Both bear 19th-century two-light windows—a Decorated style example to the nave, Perpendicular to the chancel. The south transept contains a restored two-light window with cinquefoiled heads and a simple Perpendicular traceried window on its south wall. The gabled south porch features a large four-centred chamfered sandstone rubble arch, with a three-light restored Decorated style window to its west.

Interior: The porch has a late 19th-century or early 20th-century boarded roof and a 15th-century moulded two-centre arched south doorway. The principal feature is a tall five-bay granite arcade of Pevsner A-type piers with raised lozenges carved on the capitals and four-centred moulded arches. The internal walls are rendered except for exposed stonework at the west end.

The chancel is decorated with stencilwork, probably the work of Medley Fulford, of unusually early date for this type of decoration. A 19th-century timber chancel arch is similarly decorated. The wagon roofs in the nave, chancel and transept were renewed during restoration, though the old roof was retained in the aisle. The roofs over the nave and aisle are painted. Simple 19th-century benches furnish the seating. An elaborate late 19th-century marble reredos of ornate colouring dominates the chancel.

The Norman font is of square form with a scalloped bottom edge to the bowl, which rests on a short circular stem. This stands on a square base with a small stone on each corner, two of which are carved in the form of masks. A good carved Jacobean pyramidal font cover sits above. Remains of a 14th-century sepulchral arch survive in the transept. The east window of the north aisle contains four-lights of old glass depicting St Edmund the Confessor, St Margaret, St Christopher and St Anthony.