St Patricks Church of Ireland, Newtownards Road, Belfast, Co. Antrim

St Patrick's Church of Ireland, Newtownards Road, Ballymacarrett, Belfast

St Patrick's Church of Ireland is a six-bay Gothic Revival church built between 1891 and 1893 to designs by the Belfast architect Samuel Patrick Close (1842–1925), who established his independent practice in 1872 and was responsible for a large number of Church of Ireland buildings, predominantly in counties Antrim and Down. The church is orientated east to west, cruciform in plan, and constructed in rock-faced Scrabo sandstone — locally quarried — with smooth sandstone toothed quoins to the corners, stepped buttresses, a natural slate roof, and Perpendicular style window tracery throughout. The building was constructed in two phases: the first phase, built by Dixon and Campbell, was completed when the church was consecrated and dedicated to Saint Patrick on 11th March 1893; the four-stage bell tower at the south-west corner was added in the second phase, completed in 1903, and was based on the tower at Magdalene College, Oxford. The tower additions were constructed by Messrs Thornbury of Wynford Street.

The site has a long ecclesiastical history. The parochial district of Ballymacarrett was formed from a portion of the parish of Knockbreda in 1825 — the first new parish to be founded between Knockbreda and Holywood since medieval times. The first parish church, Christ Church, was built in 1826 and consecrated on 4th January 1827. The first edition Ordnance Survey map of 1834 records a rectangular building on the same plot as the current church. Christ Church was doubled in size in 1860 to meet the demands of a rapidly growing local population, but the enlarged building still could not accommodate the expanding congregation. A watercolour illustration dated before 1893 depicts the enlarged Christ Church as a Gothic, cruciform building with a three-stage tower at its western entrance. The vicar, the Reverend G. G. Mervyn, initiated plans for a new church capable of seating 1,500 parishioners, and the foundation stone of the present building was laid on 26th October 1891.

The church was severely damaged during the Belfast Blitz of 1941, when a direct hit by a Luftwaffe bomb destroyed the roof, one of the transepts, a gallery, and all the original stained glass windows, with the exception of two panels that had been removed at the outbreak of the war for safekeeping. Restoration was not completed until a decade later: the remaining galleries were removed, and a new transept was constructed to replace the one that had been lost. The restored church was rededicated on 31st May 1952, and the two surviving stained glass panels from the east and west sides of the original structure were reinstalled shortly afterwards.

The roof is finished in natural slate with terracotta ridge and lead valleys. Rainwater goods are a mix of cast-iron, uPVC, and extruded aluminium; ogee-shaped cast-iron gutters sit on ovolo-shaped stone mouldings with brackets at upper level. There is a sandstone chimney stack in three stages to the north elevation at the east end.

The principal elevation faces south. The four-stage bell tower is located at the south-west corner and serves as the main entrance. It has stepped stone gabled set-back buttresses with toothed quoin detail at all stages. At ground floor level, the entrance is formed by an equilateral arched opening with an early English style archivolt, hood moulding, and painted paired timber doors with strap hinges and a timber boarded blind panel above. The second stage has a large equilateral window with Perpendicular tracery. The third stage has a clock set in a circular moulding. The fourth stage has pairs of arched openings with louvres and decorated Y-shaped tracery at the top, with shallow blind arcading behind and below, and is topped with a moulded stone string course with small gargoyles set at an angle at each end. Above the string course is shallow blind arcading with battlements, crocketed pinnacles to each corner, and a central pinnacle set at an angle to the centre.

The middle part of the south elevation is divided into three bays, each with square-headed tripartite windows separated by stone buttresses. Above these bays is a pitched roof in natural slate with a clerestory having three shallow four-centred arched windows with hood mouldings. A gabled bay to the south-east has two paired square-headed windows under a single hood moulding at ground floor level, a moulded stone string course above, and an equilateral arched window at upper level with intersecting Y-tracery in the Perpendicular style. The west face of this projecting gable has two square-headed window openings at low level and three lancet windows at high level — one to the north being truncated — all with hood mouldings, and a decorated saddle-stone to the apex of the gable. A lean-to single-storey abutment is attached to the east face of the projecting gable, with paired timber doors set in an equilateral arched opening with smooth sandstone voussoirs and toothed quoins to the architrave.

The west elevation has the bell tower to the south-west corner, with detailing matching the south elevation except that the windows to each stage are lancet-arched and diminish in height towards the top. To the south-east of the tower is a gabled wall with a large equilateral arched window with Perpendicular tracery and stepped three-stage buttresses to either side. The gable has three-block kneelers, a moulded coping, and a decorated saddle-stone to the apex. To the north-west is the lean-to gable end of the north aisle, with an equilateral arched window opening with simple tracery and a hood moulding, and a diagonal buttress to the north corner.

The north elevation is partly obscured by the church hall. It follows the same detailing as the south elevation, with a single-storey side aisle to the middle, a pitched natural slate roof, and a clerestory to the nave wall beyond with three shallow four-centred arched windows with hood mouldings. A gabled porch projects from the gabled transept, with details matching the south elevation. At the east end, stepping back from the gable, is a smaller gable with an infilled lancet window at lower level and a smaller lancet window above, together with a series of smaller returns containing the boiler house, and the sandstone chimney stack in three stages.

The east elevation has a lean-to at the north end with a single centrally placed lancet window. Projecting forward from this is a gable with a centrally placed square-headed pair of windows with a hood moulding and Gothic tracery with an ogee profile. To the south is the tall chancel gable with stepped buttresses and a large equilateral arched window with Perpendicular tracery. The buttress to the south of the window is set-back, with a matching buttress at 90 degrees on the south elevation of the chancel. The gable has kneelers, coping, a decorated saddle-stone, and three lancet windows to the south face. The gable to the main nave is visible at high level with the same detailing. The south transept gable has a centrally placed equilateral arched window with Perpendicular tracery and a smooth sandstone architrave, with a lean-to porch at the south end.

To the north-west of the church stands the former National School, now used as a church hall. This is a six-bay single-storey building with roughcast rendered walls, buttresses, smooth rendered architraves with lugs to the windows, a pitched roof with parapet gables, a natural slate finish, and uPVC rainwater goods. The openings are square-headed with replacement casement windows. The principal elevation faces south, with the entrance in a shouldered gabled return: the entrance door is set in a square-headed opening with a smooth rendered architrave featuring a four-centred arch, a blocked plinth, a central block to the jamb, and a hood moulding, with paired sheeted timber doors. A modern extension has been added to the east, comprising single-storey dry-dash rendered walls, a natural slate roof, and top-hung casement windows.

The church is sited on the north side of Newtownards Road on a level site. The east, west, and south boundaries are defined by a low stone wall with cast-iron railings, and vehicular entrances on the south and east boundaries have large square pillars with cast-iron gates. A rubble sandstone wall with upright stone copings runs along the north boundary; the caretaker has advised that this wall pre-dates the current church and is reputed to be the oldest wall in Ballymacarrett. The railings and pillars on the Newtownards Road frontage have been moved back from their original position as a result of a road widening scheme. St Patrick's Church of Ireland remains an imposing focal point within the Ballymacarrett area, owing to its impressive scale, well-articulated cruciform form, and distinctive stonework.