Baptist Church, West Street, Stewartstown, BT71 5HT

Baptist Church, West Street, Stewartstown

This is a detached single-storey church, originally built in 1843 and rebuilt in 1878. It is now in use as a Baptist Hall. The building is T-shaped in plan with a single-storey flat-roofed extension to the rear (south). Though small in scale, it is well proportioned.

The front (north) elevation faces onto West Street and features a projecting gabled bay with recessed side wings. The projecting bay is gable-ended and is three bays in width. It has two-storey long pointed-arched lancet windows to the sides and a pointed-arched timber-sheeted door to the centre with a cut-stone surround. Above the door is a carved stone drip moulding set on decorative corbelled-stone label stops. A quatrefoil roundel window sits above the doorway, surmounted by a cut-stone datestone inscribed 'METHODIST CHURCH ERECTED 1843 REBUILT 1878'. Two pointed-arched windows sit in each side wing. All windows are replacement uPVC with 'Y' tracery and are covered with metal grills. Windows are set on cut-stone sills.

The side (west and east) elevations are gable-ended with a single pointed-arched window to the centre. External walls are ruled-and-lined render with cut-stone quoins to the edges. Two-stage diagonal reducing buttresses are positioned at the outer corners of the front elevation and the front entrance projection, adding a decorative element to the façade. The roof is pitched with stone skews and kneelers to each gable-end, and has a cut-stone urn-shaped finial to the apex of the front bay roof. Rainwater goods are extruded aluminium.

The rear (south) elevation is partially obscured by returns and has a pointed-arched opening to the right. The single-storey flat-roofed return features an assortment of square-headed timber casement windows and a square-headed timber-sheeted door to the west. Rainwater goods are replacement aluminium.

The church is located on the south side of West Street, to the west of Stewartstown, set back from the road behind a low rendered wall with cut-stone capping and wrought-iron railings with Fleur-de-Lil motifs. Cut-stone pillars support a painted wrought-iron pedestrian entrance gate to both the west and east. A gravelled parking area is to the west, accessed via a pillared vehicle entrance gate.

Historical records show the original building on the 1857 Ordnance Survey map as a rectangular structure on an east-west axis. By the 1906 Ordnance Survey map, the present T-shaped church was shown. Whether the church was completely rebuilt in 1878 or the original building was extended northwards and remodelled remains uncertain. The building is believed to have been in use as a Baptist hall since the 1990s.