Christ Church, Bell Road, Urney, Strabane, Co Tyrone, BT82 9RS

Christ Church, Bell Road, Urney, Strabane, Co Tyrone

A double-height Gothic Revival Church of Ireland built in 1868 to designs by Welland and Gillespie, located on the east side of Bell Road. The church is set within a rural churchyard with mature trees to the west, bounded to the road by rubble walling with rubble coping and accessed through a pair of square sandstone pillars on a splayed plinth surmounted by a gabled mansard coping with a carved quatrefoil motif, supporting a pair of painted decorative iron gates. A secondary pedestrian access to the north-east is provided through a pair of plain sandstone pillars supporting a cast-iron gate.

The building comprises a central nave with a canted chancel to the east; a double-gabled transept to the north abutted to the west by a square tower; a gabled outshoot to the south and a gabled vestry to the south-east; a single-storey gabled porch to the west; and a recent flat-roofed boiler house to the south-west at basement level, accessed via concrete steps enclosed within a concrete retaining wall.

The roof is of pitched natural slate with raised sandstone verges featuring trefoil finials over corbelled kneelers. Decorative square chimney-stacks with trefoil perforations are located to the south and west gables. The walls are constructed of roughly coursed rubble over a stepped plinth with ashlar sandstone quoins and a sill course, reinforced by diagonal buttresses with offsets.

The principal gable faces west and contains a circular rose window with leaded stained glass surmounted by hood moulding and rubble voussoirs, with a blind chamfered pointed-arched-headed window to the apex. The gable is abutted at ground floor by the porch, which features a gabled half-dormer containing a narrow window flanked by buttresses with gablets. A cusped pointed-arched-headed entrance containing double-leaf vertically sheeted timber doors is set within a rebated sandstone surround flanked by colonettes and surmounted by hood moulding on the north elevation.

The north elevation consists of the nave, containing a single window at right, abutted at left by the double-gabled transept. Each gable, separated by a buttress with a gablet, contains a single window, with a blind chamfered pointed-arched-headed window to the apex. A single stained glass window is located to the east elevation.

The two-stage tower is positioned at the centre of the north elevation. The first stage contains a pointed-arched-headed vertically-sheeted entrance door within a cusped chamfered sandstone surround with decorative stop and hood moulding, surmounted by a narrow square-headed recess in a sandstone surround. A narrow window with a similar recess is positioned on the west elevation. A moulded string course runs to the belfry stage, which features colonettes at the corners and a pointed-arched-headed louvred opening surmounted by hood moulding to each elevation. The tower is surmounted by a splay-footed spire with lucarnes and trefoil perforations.

The east elevation is abutted by a five-sided canted chancel. Each cheek, separated by buttresses with offsets and gablets, contains a reticulated bar tracery window with leaded stained glass surmounted by hood moulding.

The south elevation consists of the nave at left, containing two windows, abutted at centre by a gabled outshoot with a single leaded stained glass window and a small chamfered pointed-arched-headed aperture to the apex, and abutted at right by the gabled vestry containing a single window, a small chamfered pointed-arched-headed aperture to the apex, and a narrow square-headed window to low level.

Throughout the building, windows are characterised by pointed-arched-headed forms with sandstone tracery containing leaded lattice lights in stepped sandstone surrounds surmounted by hood moulds with label stops and rubble voussoirs.

The west elevation contains a square-headed vertically sheeted entrance door surmounted by a pointed-arched-headed spandrel, supported on corbels and containing a plain glazed oculus, with hood moulding above.

The gutters and downpipes are replacement cast-iron items with decorative fleur-de-lys ties. The walls are finished in squared-and-snecked rock-faced rubble with sandstone quoins.