St Marks Church, 158 Perth Road, Dundee

St Mark’s Church, built in 1868-9 by Frederick T Pilkington of Pilkington and Bell, and extended in 1879 by Ireland and MacLaren, is a muscular, well-detailed, and massed Gothic church featuring a steeple and basement hall. It is constructed from two-tone ashlar with coloured bands and decorative details.

The tower and spire, located at the north-east corner, feature a shoulder-arched door within a pointed porch facing east, and an advanced gablet to the north with a two-light window and hexafoil rose. The square tower has clasping buttresses chamfered across three stages. Paired louvred lancets feature at the belfry stage, connected at the base of the second stage and at the impost level by dog-tooth bands. The octagonal spire has decorated bands and finials.

The north elevation is impressively wide, with an elaborate central piece featuring paired pointed-arched doorways under taller arches, the apex of which is depressed with a circular opening (hexafoil) and carving. A carved foliated band course runs within a wide arched porch. Large pointed arches recess over, containing twin two-light windows with quatrefoils and hexafoils in elaborately carved tympana. A cross finial tops the elevation. A similar but simpler window design is found in the flanking gablets. Stepped blind arcading sits above, and a two-light window with a tall gabletted lancet breaking the eaves of a steep pavilion roof is located on the right bay. A wrought-iron finial is also present.

The west elevation, from left to right, exhibits a steep pyramidal roof over twin lancets, followed by three advanced asymmetrical gabletted bays: a two-light window with a quatrefoil on the left; a central four-light window with a large trefoiled tympanum, with a five-light bow at ground floor level; and, on the right (added in 1879), a smaller four-light gable slightly advanced at ground floor level. The east elevation mirrors this design. Finials are missing.

The rear elevation, designed by Ireland and MacLaren in 1879, contains pyramidal-roofed turrets with wrought-iron finials and cusped lancets in the re-entrant angles between the side gables and chancel, with chamfered infill at ground floor level. A large rose window is set in the south gable, alongside a gable end stack. A two-storey vestry has two bays of shouldered arched windows facing south, with a blank, chamfered wall to the neighbouring property. A single-story Session House/hall has a canted east elevation with cusped lancets and a vesica.

The church is roofed with slate and features small-pane leaded glazing, including some stained glass. Cathedral panes are used in the vestry and hall.

The interior comprises a U-plan gallery supported by stout masonry columns and timber, twisted barley-sugar columns. Slim cast-iron columns at the gallery level carry hammerbeam roofs formed of timber, with wrought-iron ties. There is an ornate bowed timber pulpit and organ case (without pipes). Original pews and light fittings remain. Stained glass windows, four dating from 1897 and four by Stephen Adam of Glasgow (1903), are also present.