Church of the Holy Cross

The Church of the Holy Cross is a Grade I listed church located in Gilling East. The church features an arcade dating from around 1200, an early 14th-century chancel, a 14th-century south arcade, and a late 15th-century tower. There are also a 19th-century organ chamber and restoration work. The building is constructed of sandstone rubble and ashlar, topped with a Westmorland slate roof.

The structure includes a west tower, a three-bay aisled nave with a north porch, and a three-bay chancel with an organ chamber to the north. The two-stage tower has stepped diagonal buttresses, and its west window consists of four stepped round-headed transomed lights beneath a pointed hoodmould. Each face of the belfry features three round-headed lights under an elliptical arch. The tower is crowned with an embattled parapet and pinnacles.

The north aisle contains 19th-century windows in Geometrical and Decorated styles. The north porch has a pointed doorway with a divided overlight, flanked by pilasters that support concave-moulded capitals and a banded pediment. The south aisle features a pointed doorway with two chamfered orders in the second bay, and flat-headed two-light cusped ogee windows, with the western window being from the 19th century.

In the chancel, the north side has an organ chamber with a two-light east window in Decorated style. The south side includes a basket-arched priest's door beneath a Tudor-arched window with four stepped round-headed lights, a three-light reticulated window to the left, and a two-light Decorated window to the right. The east end has a 19th-century three-light window with reticulated tracery.

Inside, the church features arcades on slender cylindrical piers with square abaci and pointed arches of two orders; the north arches are chamfered while the south arches are plain. The south aisle contains a 14th-century ogee-arched tomb recess with elaborate crockets and sub-cusping. At the east end of the south aisle are stone effigies of Sir Nicholas Fairfax, who died in 1572, and his two wives. At the west end, there is a tomb for Sir Thomas Fairfax, who died in 1828, featuring a white marble figure of Piety reclining over two urns, along with two deeply incised floriate cross grave slabs nearby.