Church Of St John The Evangelist And All Saints

ST31SE KINGSTONE CP KINGSTONE VILLAGE

4/30 Church of St. John the Evangelist and All Saints (formerly listed as Church of All Saints)

4.2.58

GV II*

Anglican parish church. Recorded by 1291; porch and chancel C14, remainder C15. Ham stone cut and squared with ashlar dressings, tower part rendered; chancel, vestry and porch have Welsh slated roofs between stepped coped gables, nave has nearly-flat lead sheet roof behind battlemented parapets. Three-unit plan of 2-bay chancel, crossing tower without transepts, and 3-by nave, with added south porch and north-east vestry. Chancel has no plinth or buttresses; east window a C15 3-light traceried window in hollowed pointed-arched recess with plain stopped label; on south side two 2-light C14 traceried windows, possibly recut in C19, with labels, one having headstops and the other blockstops; on north side a 2-light flat-arched window with deep square label in slightly hollowed chamfered recess, and the projecting vestry with simple lancet window in north gable and pointed-arched doorway on west side. Tower of 3 stages, with tall plinth, string courses, the top with gargoyles, then battlemented parapets; full-height buttresses slightly offset from corners, with diagonal applied shaft bases for now-missing pinnacles; 3-light earlier C15 traceried windows in hollowed recesses with headstop labels to the intended transept arches; to stage 2 on north and south sides are 2-light flat-arched windows in recesses without labels, and to third stage all round are matching 2-light pointed-arched windows; the windows to stages 2 and 3 south side set in rendered panels and fitted with ornamental pierced stone frets, whereas the others have louvre baffles: on south-east corner an octagonal-plan stair turret taller than remainder of tower, crowned with flagmast. Nave has plinth, offset corner buttresses and bay buttresses to north side, with battlemented parapets over plain string course; the side windows match those to stage 1 of tower; the west window a wider 3-light window in deep recess with moulded headstop label, under which is an elaborately moulded pointed arched joorway, new blocked, with tablet-flowers to jamb mouldings, set in rectangular recess with carved spandrils, no label. Porch set in centre of south side, and has angled corner buttresses, pointed chamfered archway with stilted outer order; C19 memorials mounted outside on east and west walls. Interior not accessible, but noted were moulded, not panelled, tower arches; a C15 font, and otherwise C19 fittings; fragments of medieval glass in tracery of north windows. (VCH, Vol III, l974; Pevsner N, Buildings of England, South and West Somerset, 1958).

Listing NGR: ST3788213637