St Peter's RC Church, Great George's Street, Warrenpoint, Newry, Co Down, BT34 3NF

St Peter's Roman Catholic Church is an early 19th-century church with a cruciform plan, to which a tower was added in the late 19th century. The church stands on the corner of Great George's Street and St Peter's Street, with its front elevation facing southeast.

The roof is pitched and covered in natural slate with crested ridge tiles, leaded valleys, and moulded rainwater goods supported on wrought iron brackets. The gables have saddle copings with cross finials, except for the front gable which is abutted by the tower. The walls have a chamfered basecourse and are cement dry dashed with a smooth band at window cill level and another at the spring of the arch level. Ogee metal gutters and square section metal rainwater goods run throughout. The front (southeast) gable is in ashlar granite and is almost completely abutted by the later tower. Two-stage clasping buttresses stand at the corners of all gables on a chamfered basecourse. The first stage is broad and plain with a moulded sloping coping between ground and first floor. Above this the buttress is more slender and at gable level it has a moulded stringcourse. It then rises above the gable as an octagonal pinnacle with plat band and conical cap terminated in a foliated finial.

All windows are tall lancets with smooth rendered architrave and flush cill. They have chamfered reveals and hood moulds. The glazing is either the original cast iron tracery in clear and pink glass or, in the modern porch, later stained and leaded glass. The side walls of the nave (facing southwest and northeast) are each identical, with three tracery windows. The northeast elevation is additionally abutted at the left by a modern porch which obscures the lower part of the left window. The porch has a pitched natural slate roof with crested ridge tiles. Its cement dashed walls sit on a polished granite chamfered basecourse with clasping buttresses to the gable end, constructed in thin panels of polished granite and coped (along with the gable) in concrete. Its southeast wall and its northeast gable each have a small modern lancet window with polished granite cill and modern stained glass. Its northwest wall has a wide doorway with a depressed Gothic head containing a pair of modern tongue-and-groove sheeted stained doors.

The front (southeast) facing wall of each transept is identical, having one tracery window to the centre. The end gables of each transept (one facing southwest, the other northeast) are identical. Each has a doorway at ground floor level consisting of a pair of diagonally sheeted doors with strap hinges set within a deep chamfered Gothic headed doorcase with hood mould over. A modern granite holy water font is set into the splayed jamb of the door—on the left-hand side of the northeast elevation and the right-hand side of the southwest elevation. There is a moulded string course between ground and first floor level, tied into the buttress on either side. In the gable at first floor level is a pair of lancet windows with a quatrefoil ventilator set high in the gable above. The rear (northwest) facing walls of the transepts are each blank and abutted by the lower side chapels.

Each side chapel sits in the angle between the sanctuary and the transepts. They are identical with flat roofs concealed behind an embattled parapet. The walls are roughly wet dashed with smooth rendered quoins and banding to the walls and concrete coping to the parapet. Their rear (northwest) walls are blank and the end walls (facing southwest and northeast) each have three small lancet windows with leaded glazing and render architraves. The ground falls away at this point revealing a basement level. Each side wall (facing southwest and northeast) of the sanctuary is identical, abutted to ground floor by the side chapels. Over are three small lancet windows set in granite architrave and hood moulds, their cills level with the side chapel roofs. Over these windows is a small coped gable with matching pitched natural slate roof tied into the sanctuary roof.

The rear (northwest) gable of the sanctuary has a semi-basement and is abutted at basement and ground floor level by a modern sacristy block. The remaining gable is smooth rendered to first floor, wet dashed to ground floor and basement. The basement walls have a large modern timber window at the right end. In the gable are three tall lancet windows, the central one taller, all stained and leaded glass. Above in the apex of the gable is a small lancet vent. The gable apex has a broken finial. The sacristy is two storeys and has a pitched natural slate roof and wet dashed walls. Its ground floor is level with the basement of the sanctuary. Its windows are all modern lancets, stained timber with plain and stained glass. Its main door (on the southwest wall) is tongue-and-groove sheeted and in a Gothic headed opening and it has a modern louvered door and shutters on its northeast wall. Its passage is enclosed by railings.

The front tower is a later addition and is three stages high with a slender broached spire. Its walls are in ashlar granite and its spire in ashlar sandstone. Buttresses rise full height on each elevation. They are broadest at the first stage, set in from the corners slightly on each upper stage. They step in between the first and second stages, halfway up the second stage, between the second and third stages, and terminate halfway up the third stage. The front (southeast) wall is as follows. The first stage has the main entrance, a pair of diagonally sheeted tongue-and-groove doors set within a deep chamfered Gothic headed reveal with a hood mould over. Over is a moulded string course (which continues around the tower over the buttresses), stepping up to the front over a modern polished granite plaque which reads "1841 / 1991 / IN HONOREM SANCTI / PETRI APOSTOLI". Stage two is taller than the others and has three lancet openings (the top one taller), with chamfered reveals. The central one contains a statue of St Peter on a truncated octagonal plinth. The left and right openings have leaded lights of diamond quarries. In the wall over there is a glazed quatrefoil with flush platband linking it to the buttresses. Between the second and third stages is a moulded string course.

The third stage is the belfry. It is narrower than the rest of the tower, instepping on three sloping courses of masonry. It contains a pair of lancets with a quatrefoil filling the common spandrel above; all are set within a deep chamfered granite reveal with hood mould over which continues as a string course. Wire mesh grills cover all openings. The buttresses terminate at spring or arch level (below the stringcourse). The broached spire has a small moulded cornice and its first masonry course is decorated with shallow cusps. Its southeast, northwest, southwest, and northeast faces each have a tall slender lucarne with pitched masonry roof and lancet on the gable with tiny quatrefoil over. Near the top, each pitch has a small gabled vent and at the top of each are two rounded crockets. A metallic cross finial tops the spire.

The left and right (southwest and northeast) cheeks of the tower are abutted to the first and lower part of second stages by two-storey canted bays. Each has a two-stage basecourse, a string course between each stage (a continuation from the tower) and a window on each cheek. At first stage level the windows are small lancets and at second stage they are small trefoils. Each has a pitched half-attached spire roof with finial. Over on the tower wall is a quatrefoil light (as that to the front) and every detail above is as the front of the tower. The northwest wall of the tower abuts the front gable of the church at first and second stage levels. Its other stages are as the front of the tower.

The boundary to Great George's Street South is canted forward to the centre. It consists of a small dressed granite dwarf wall carrying iron railings with cast iron detailing to top, bottom, and middle of each vertical, with Gothic spear finials. The railings are supported to each outer end on plain granite piers with swept copings. To the centre the railings are supported on one-piece granite gate piers with Gothic panels, incised spandrels, and swept copings. They carry original gates (as the railings) on modern hinges which allow the gates to swing back flush with the railings. On entry into the church grounds, running parallel with the front boundary is a retaining wall clad in modern mock granite ceramic tiles and carrying modern railings; to either end are steps up to the main path around the church. At the transepts the ground falls away to the rear. The boundary to St Peter's Street is a cement dashed wall with irregular granite rubble coping. A modern car park to the rear with small hall and dashed walls is of no interest.