Church Of St Mary

The Church of St Mary is a Grade II listed building located on Church Road in Lower Allithwaite. It was built in 1865 by architect E.G. Paley and features rock-faced limestone with sandstone ashlar dressings and slate roofs. The church consists of a nave, a gabled south aisle, a chancel, and a north vestry and organ loft. Architectural details include sill courses, coped gables, and diagonal buttresses.

The south aisle has five bays, with two weathered buttresses and two-light single-chamfered-mullioned plate tracery windows that are adorned with hoodmoulds and decorative stops. The gabled porch features an arch with corbelled shafts and a gable cross, along with return quatrefoils. The west and east ends of the church have similar windows. The nave has a west end that projects forward and is supported by diagonal buttresses. It includes two lancets with a sexfoil above, flanked by large buttresses that support a bell turret with a segmental pointed arch. The turret has weathered sides and an octagonal top with quatrefoil openings, a short spire with lucarnes, and a cross.

The north side of the church lacks a sill course and hoodmoulds on the windows. The two-bay chancel features a three-light double-chamfered plate tracery east window and a gable cross, which is also present on the nave gable. The south side of the chancel has two-light windows similar to those in the aisle, while the north side has a similar two-light window without a sill course. The vestry and organ loft consist of two gabled bays with entrances on the west and east sides and single-chamfered-mullioned straight-headed windows.

Inside, the church has a five-bay arcade supported by round piers and a continuous hoodmould with head stops. The roof features arch-braced collars and king posts. The plain square font is set on a squat octagonal shaft with a large capital. The chancel arch is supported by paired short corbelled shafts, and the chancel roof has paired arch braces to the rafters. The pulpit is boldly carved with corbelled triangular arches. Late 19th-century stalls, a reredos, and an altar rail, likely designed by Paley and Austin, include tracery panels and turned balusters, as does the organ case. There are also sedilia and a cupboard recess with tracery heads. The aisle contains an altar with a rail similar to that in the chancel.