Craigrownie Church, Church Road, Cove And Kilcreggan

Craigrownie Church, Church Road, Cove and Kilcreggan

A substantial Gothic church built in 1852 and significantly extended and altered by the architects Honeyman and Keppie in 1889. The building is planned as a T-shaped hall with transept, featuring steeply pitched roofs throughout. It is constructed of whinstone and sandstone rubble with stugged sandstone margins and dressings, incorporating a base course, string course, hoodmoulds, sawtooth coped buttresses, lancet windows, quoins, and chamfered reveals.

The south-east elevation presents a five-bay nave with a broad gabled transept and recessed chancel bay set back to the outer left. The transept is asymmetrical and gabled, with buttresses supporting a three-light lancet window at the upper stage flanked by diminutive trefoil lights and a lozenge light in the gablehead. A three-light lancet window appears on the left return beneath a whinstone relieving arch. A lean-to porch at the centre ground features a two-light leaded lancet window that breaks the eaves line and a quatrefoil light in the gablehead, with gabletted buttresses on either side. The porch contains a broad Tudor-arched door with ball-flower moulding around the lintel, a whinstone relieving arch, and a two-leaf boarded hinged door. A small trefoil window sits on the right return with a stepped string course and label stop. To the right of the porch at ground level is a lancet window, with a larger plate-traceried window further right. The recessed bay to the outer left contains steps leading up to a blocked pointed arch door at the corner right, and steps leading down to a shouldered arch basement door to the outer left. The nave recess to the outer right is delineated by buttresses with two-light lancets. Beyond this is a broad bay featuring an arcade of three pointed arches with dividing colonnettes, the centre arch being blind, with a broad gable breaking the eaves above and a large rosette in the gablehead. A shouldered, gabled bellcote crowns the chancel arch, pierced with lancets and a central lozenge in the gablehead.

The north-west elevation shows a five-bay nave with a broad, asymmetrical M-gabled transept and vestry set back to the outer right. The five-bay nave has bays delineated by sawtooth coped buttresses. The bay to the outer left features a gable breaking the eaves, two lancets at ground level, and a rosette in the gablehead. A broad asymmetrical gabled bay to the penultimate right contains a pointed arch door at centre with a two-leaf boarded and hinged door, a three-light lancet window above flanked by a diminutive trefoil light, and a lozenge in the gablehead. A two-light lancet sits to the left at ground level, with a plate-traceried window to the outer left beneath a stepped hoodmould. A lower, narrow gabled vestry block projects to the outer right, accessed by steps leading to a trefoil-headed door.

The south-west elevation is dominated by a broad gable with diagonal buttresses at the outer left and right and a central buttress, flanking two-light lancets at ground level and three narrow lancets at the upper stage. A stepped string course runs horizontally.

The roof is covered with grey-green slate, featuring sawtooth skews, red terracotta ridging, and star finials. Windows throughout feature leaded and stained glass.

The interior contains an open timber truss roof resting on sandstone corbels, with dark oak dado and pews. A late 19th-century organ and screen occupy the north-east end of the church. A decoratively carved pulpit stands to the left of the chancel. Circa 1920s mural paintings of the four Evangelists, executed by the Zyndkaisen sisters (members of the congregation), decorate the squinches at the roof crossing over the chancel. Various stained glass windows throughout are almost entirely figurative, including a window commemorating John McElroy (1802–1876), the developer of Cove. A lithograph of the church prior to the late 19th-century alterations, signed by H MacKinny and credited to McClure and McDonald lithographers, is preserved in the vestry.