Church of the Sacred Heart, Killowen Road, Ballincurry, Kilkeel, Newry, Co Down, BT34 3AE

Church of the Sacred Heart

This is a gabled cruciform chapel of English Gothic Revival style, built in 1871 and oriented north to south, with the entrance in the south wall. The building is constructed from polygonal grey granite rubble with ashlar dressings. The front façade displays larger and more carefully selected rubble stone than the other elevations. A canted ashlar plinth course with rubblework below runs around the entire building.

The roof is natural Welsh slate with blue clay roll-top ridge. Heavy gauge aluminium ogee gutters are set on stone corbel brackets, and large diameter spun aluminium downpipes drain the roof.

The west front gable is crowned by a bellcote supporting a stone finial cross. The bellcote's coping stones project and are stepped and interlocking. All stonework to this element is flush pointed, as is all ashlar work throughout. All arrises are chamfered, and to the outer corners these are stopped. The bellcote rests on a projecting sloping stringcourse below which is a cartouche inscribed '1871'. This forms part of an advanced panel of rubble with ashlar quoins. Below the cartouche is a quatrefoil vent formed by four stones, set just below the level of the main roof ridge.

The complete wall below this point is divided into three vertical panels. The two narrow side panels are in plain rubble walling with strap pointing. The centre panel is advanced and demarcated from the side panels by three stage-stepped ashlar buttresses with gabled caps and trefoil insets, each surmounted by a stone cross on a plinth block. The steps to the second and first stages are pitched.

In the centre panel below the quatrefoil is a triple lancet light. All three are simple Gothic style, with the centre one higher than the other two; all dressings are splayed. A common label mould spans across and stops at each end against the buttress, while on the mullions it is stopped by an acorn. Cills are flush. Below the triple lancet light is the main entrance, approached by two granite steps with splayed modern metal handrails and a raised threshold. The Gothic encasement returns in two moulded recesses: the first is pulvinated and the second is hollow; both are stopped in the outer course. Double doors are sheeted varnished pine with decorative iron hinge facings. A modern globe light is positioned over the door.

The outer corners of the west wall each have a pair of two-stage buttresses set at right angles, detailed as described above. The nave extends four bays up to the transepts, with a single Gothic lancet to each bay. All windows have stopped label moulds, flush cills, and quarry leaded glazing with similar detailing throughout except where otherwise stated. Between the windows of bays two and three from the left is a two-stage buttress detailed as on the west front.

The transept advances by one bay with one window as in the nave in the west wall. Corner buttresses match those of the west façade at both east and west corners. The coped gable has a stone finial cross and a triple light window as on the west façade. The east wall of the transept has no openings. The Sanctuary advances by one bay with a single window as in the nave. The east gable has a plain stone finial with chamfered coping, two-stage corner buttresses, and a triple lancet light as on the transept gable.

A later single-storey sacristy extends from a lean-to roof pitched against the east wall of the north transept, with an intersecting double-pitched roof at right angles terminating in a cross-pitch hipped at the south end and gabled at the north, all in natural Welsh slate. A rubble stone chimney with flush splayed cap serves the sacristy. The boiler room door is slatted and stained. The sacristy entrance door is sheeted, and windows are paired lancets with detailing in a scaled-down version of the main building. The north and west sides of the sacristy extension have pairs of timber Gothic-headed windows set in a squared ashlar surround. A modern disabled access ramp in concrete with metal handrailing is wrapped around the sacristy. The north transept is detailed exactly as the south, but with the lean-to roof of the sacristy abutting the east wall. The north side has a pair of Gothic-headed lights set into a paired ashlar surround.