Barclay Church Hall Link, Barclay Place, Bruntsfield Place, Edinburgh

Barclay Church Hall Link at Barclay Place, Bruntsfield Place, Edinburgh

This Grade A building comprises a Ruskinian and Romantic Gothic church designed by Frederick T Pilkington between 1862 and 1864, with a later church hall wing added by Sydney Mitchell and Wilson in 1891.

The church occupies an awkward trapezoid site and is planned on an ovoid or clam-shell shape. Its most prominent feature is a massive tower to the north with a facetted lucarned stone spire. The building is constructed in bull-faced cream sandstone (now grey) with ashlar dressings, featuring cusped surrounds to windows and doors in red sandstone and polychrome voussoirs. A high battered base course runs around the building, divided above by a moulded course. The roof plan is complex. A programme of naturalistic sculpture by Pearce was undertaken but remained uncompleted.

The north elevation and tower contain the principal entrance, positioned in the advanced battered base to the right. Visitors ascend steps bounded by saddle-backed parapets to paired diagonally-boarded two-leaf timber doors with decorative cast-iron hinges and handles. Above the doors is a twelve-pane gothic fanlight with Art Nouveau glass. A trumeau occupies the centre with flanking paired columns; the capitals are carved with angels bearing heraldic shields and streamers. A pointed-arched hoodmould surmounts the door with angel label stops at each end.

A prominent moulded band separates the base from the first stage of the tower. On each face of the first stage are paired pointed-arched louvred openings serving the internal space. A gabled pointed-arched opening on each face is divided by a colonette with a roundel above breaking the eaves of the spire. Four slated lucarnes sit on alternate facets of the spire, which is divided by rope-moulding and punctuated by recessed rosettes.

To the left of the tower is a hipped gable containing a plate-traceried rose window with a cusped red sandstone over-arch, lighting an upper gallery within. Flanking buttresses clasp the corner and are linked by a shallow sloping stone projecting roof decorated with vine-leaf carving at the cornice. Polychrome relieving arches sit above tripartite windows; below these are small quatrefoil lights over trefoil-headed pointed-arched windows separated by colonnettes.

The east elevation features a curved bay to the left (adjoining the later church hall) with three angled gables above. Each gable contains a plate-traceried three-light window with three quatrefoil windows above, flanked by colonnettes with naturalistic foliate capitals. Two sets of paired small pointed windows flank a dwarf colonettes below, with those to the right angled to a stair. Blocks of stone awaiting carving remain at the corners.

Paired diagonally-boarded doors with small leaded-pane fanlights are set in shouldered-arched openings and separated by a trumeau with a foliate capital, all contained within a cusped pointed-arched and gabled porch to the right. An engaged circular stair tower occupies the centre bay, featuring a polychrome-slated conical roof and cusped pointed-arched windows angled to the stair. A circular bartizan sits in the re-entrant angle to the right with small pointed windows. A further diagonally-boarded door in a cusped pointed-arched opening under a gabled porch is positioned in the outer right bay.

The west elevation (Barclay Place) contains a recessed panel with an arcaded top to the base of the tower at its outer left. Three lancets separated by colonnettes on pedestals with foliate capitals form the arcade. A steeply-gabled bay to the left holds a three-light window in a trefoil-arched opening. Beneath it is a scallop-slated lean-to roof over a triple-arched porch with two trefoil openings between the arches. Diagonally-boarded doors with small leaded-pane side-lights occupy the outer arches.

A curved bay to the centre has two angled gables, each containing a plate-traceried three-light window with three quatrefoil windows above. Three small trefoil-arched windows below carry a swathe of rich carving depicting a shepherd and sheep, palm fronds and vines—showing how the rest of the church would have appeared had all intended decoration been completed. An angled single-storey gabled porch to the right contains a trefoil-arched opening leading to a diagonally-boarded door, with small paired trefoil-arched windows with small-pane leaded glass lighting the porch. At the outer right, steps ascend to a narrow diagonally-boarded timber door in a shouldered-arched surround, leading to a small circular tower with a polychrome scallop-slated conical roof topped by a single chimney. This tower houses stairs to the boiler, lit by small trefoil-arched windows with leaded panes separated by dwarf columns.

The south elevation is largely concealed by flats to the southwest built in 1885 and by the church hall to the southeast built in 1891. It was further altered when an organ was installed in 1896. A rather Germanic steep double-canopied curved roof covers the chancel, with carved foliage beneath its eaves.

The interior contains two tiers of galleries with barley-sugar turned colonnettes to the front, supported on cast-iron columns. Curved ranks of wooden pews fill the floor below. Stairs to the upper galleries are housed in the tower, while new timber and cast-iron spiral stairs also link the galleries. A painted and gilded timber roof is carried on two massive square-section piers with palm frond capitals rising through the lower gallery, and two columns with foliate capitals and dosserets. Radial rafters and intersecting trusses with arch-braces feature barley-sugar turned queenposts and a kingpost with a foliate pendant. Gothic carved timber screens occupy the vestibule.

The church hall, designed by Sydney Mitchell and Wilson in 1891, is a Gothic structure constructed in squared and snecked yellowish sandstone with ashlar dressings. It forms a two-storey, two-bay double-gabled block with a conical-roofed circular bartizan in the re-entrant angle and a conical-roofed lantern to the ridge of the hall roof. The entrance and stair are positioned in the centre bay, with a three-storey curved linking bay connecting to the church.

The east elevation of the hall shows paired gabled bays to the left with arcading in the gables. A moulded cill band runs at first-floor level and continues into the gable. A tripartite louvred opening sits in the gable; plate tracery appears in windows within chamfered gothic surrounds at first-floor level. Below are four small shouldered lights, four trefoil-headed lights above, and four quatrefoil lights in the apex. Paired stone-mullioned and stone-transomed windows at ground level contain two larger lights below and four small lights in pointed-arched surrounds above.

A circular bartizan corbels out into the re-entrant angle, featuring Romanesque arcading beneath a slated conical roof with an ornamental finial, a ring of machicolation, and three unevenly distributed narrow windows. The entrance sits at the left of a recessed bay; a two-leaf timber door with decorative cast-iron hinges is housed in a hoodmoulded surround with carved label stops. Carving reading "suffer the little children..." decorates the tympanum. Tall narrow small-pane glazed windows in shouldered surrounds and a stone-mullioned tripartite window above light the stair.

A four-bay bowed section forms the link to the church. A door in the outer bay to the right provides access; doors and windows at ground and first-floor levels sit in shoulder-arched surrounds, paired vertically in recessed panels. Six windows at third-floor level sit in a round-arched arcade with red sandstone columns; the centre arch is blind.

The interior of the hall contains halls, a kitchen, and a meeting room at ground-floor level. At first-floor level, a large wagon-roofed hall is lit by plate-traceried windows at either end. Throughout the building, predominantly small-pane leaded windows are employed.