Methil Parish Church, Wellesley Road, Methil

The Methil Parish Church, located on Wellesley Road in Methil, was designed by Reginald Fairlie and built in 1925, with a minor alteration to the cloister around 1950. It is a Romanesque-style church built on a cruciform plan, featuring a low pyramidal-roofed tower to the northwest and a cloistral link to the transept. The exterior is constructed from snecked rubble with ashlar dressings. A droved ashlar base course with a battered cope runs along the east side, and an eaves course defines the top of the walls. Round-headed openings, buttresses, voussoirs, and stone mullions are prominent architectural details.

The southwest elevation, the main entrance front, is broad and gabled, featuring a tripartite arcade-effect entrance with two-leaf doors and a mosaic-detail tympanum. A smaller window sits centrally, flanked by arches with engaged colonnettes. A tripartite window is positioned above the entrance, and an arrowslit is visible in the gablehead.

The northwest elevation, facing Wellesley Road, has a small five-light cloister with a boarded timber door and a lean-to roof. Two widely spaced tripartite windows are above. A bell tower is situated in the penultimate bay to the right, with a window below a tripartite window in the outer right bay. A transeptal bay is positioned to the left of center, with three windows, flanking full-height buttresses, and an arrowslit in the gablehead. Further tripartite windows are present on the returns and in recessed bays to the outer left, all at clerestory level.

The bell tower is two-stage and square-plan, with windows on the ground and return to the left at the first stage. A small engaged conical-roofed tower with arrowslits sits close to the eaves on the right return. A lower link joins the towers in the re-entrant angle, with a small window above. The slightly set-back second stage has three square-headed arrowslits on each elevation, leading to a finialled pyramid roof.

The southeast elevation mirrors the northwest, incorporating a transeptal bay with three windows, buttresses, an arrowslit, a small porch with a door, and further tripartite windows. Four single lights are located to the left of center, and a small pyramid-roofed session house is situated to the outer left.

The northeast elevation has a blind five-light arcaded opening close to the gablehead, flanked by full-height buttresses with carved panels, one of which is dated 1925.

The church features multi-pane leaded glazing, with stained glass windows of note. The roof is covered in grey slates, with ashlar-coped skews.

Inside, the nave is spanned by transverse concrete arches springing from attached stone columns with variously carved cushion capitals. Segmental-headed ashlar arches define the transepts and a round-headed arch marks the chancel. A Rushworth and Dreaper organ occupies the east end, accompanied by a richly carved screen depicting Celtic and early Christian symbolism, along with integral elders' stalls featuring carved beasts. The pulpit is in a Jacobean style. The church also includes a stone font and fixed timber pews, and a small gallery is located above the narthex to the west.

Stained glass memorials include a World War I memorial in the north transept, a World War II memorial by William Wilson (dedicated 9 October 1949) in the south nave, a memorial to John Davidson, Shipmaster and Pilot, depicting "Christ Stilling the Sea" dating from around 1939 in the south nave, and three lights depicting SS John, Andrew, and Paul, dating from around 1925 in the south transept.

The church is enclosed by saddleback-coped boundary walls with pyramid-coped ashlar gatepiers and decorative cast-iron gates.