Christ Church

Christ Church, Waterside, Chesham

Christ Church was built in 1864 by the architect Raphael Brandon to serve Anglican worship in this part of Chesham. The church was constructed in the Early English style, which enjoyed great popularity in the mid-Victorian period. It was never completed to Brandon's original design, which had intended a north-west tower and north aisle. Money was tight during construction, as evidenced by uncarved stops to the hoods over doors and windows. The church was consecrated on 8 August 1864 by the Bishop of Oxford and originally provided 336 seats, the majority of them free. In 1986, a parish hall with associated rooms was added to the north-west.

The church is built on a steep, south-facing slope overlooking the road and River Chess. It is constructed in flint with limestone dressings, with voussoir-like treatment of flint alternating with stone in the arch heads. The red brick parish room has a flint-faced entrance with red-brick dressings on the south. The roofs are of slate to the church, with a flat roof to the hall.

The plan comprises a four-bay nave, south aisle, south porch, chancel, south chapel, north vestry, and north-west parish hall linked to the entrance at the west end with toilets and associated spaces.

The exterior displays the early English style clearly. The tall four-bay nave has clerestory windows formed as quatrefoiled circles. The lean-to aisle has small lancet windows on its south elevation and a two-light plate-tracery window at both the west and east ends. The east wall of the chancel has three graded lancets with hood moulds topped by uncarved blocks for head-stops, a detail repeated elsewhere on the hood stops to the south doorway and west windows. The west windows comprise two lancets with a recess for a bell between them, above which is a large circular window containing six quatrefoils. The south porch has semi-circular responds to the outer arch and a heavily moulded head, with gable crosses at the end of each gable.

The interior walls are plastered and whitened. The most striking feature is the considerable height of the nave, which is covered by a roof with arch-braced trusses incorporating large bosses at their apices and longitudinal arch-braces between. The nave is divided from the aisle by an arcade with steeply pointed double-chamfered arches supported on round piers with moulded capitals and bases. The chancel arch is very tall, rising from a shaft carried on a foliate corbel. The lean-to aisle roof is arch-braced with heavy pierced timbering in the spandrel beside the arcade. The north wall of the nave has small lancets mirroring those in the aisle's south wall. The east windows of the chancel retain Victorian stained glass.

The stone pulpit is a striking circular design with bands of dog-tooth ornament at the top and bottom of the main drum and small carved quatrefoil details in the centre portion. The font is also circular, featuring unusual petal-like decoration on the bowl and a series of gablet-type features around the base creating a serrated profile. The pews are simple with L-shaped profile ends; many survive, though there has been extensive clearance at the west end and also at the east. The chancel fittings are late twentieth-century.

The designation recognises that Christ Church is a mid-Victorian church in the Early English style with main fabric that has been little altered, and that it retains some original fittings of quality and interest.