South Free Church, Reform Street, Blairgowrie

South Free Church, Reform Street, Blairgowrie

Built in 1858, this is a Gothic church comprising a six-bay nave with a square two-stage tower topped by an octagonal spire. The main structure is constructed from small blocks of roughly squared and snecked rubble with sandstone ashlar dressings, some stugged, and features a raised ashlar base course and eaves course. Two- and three-stage buttresses with sawtooth coping and hoodmoulds with label stops punctuate the elevations. Windows are predominantly trefoil- and multifoil-headed lights, some set into pointed-arch frames, with a traceried northeast window. Details include chamfered reveals, stone mullions, raked cills, and boarded timber doors with decorative ironwork hinges.

The northeast principal elevation displays a stone-finalled gabled end. The central bay contains steps leading to a deeply-moulded doorway flanked by engaged colonettes, with two-leaf doors beneath an elaborate stepped hoodmould featuring trefoil moulding at each step and as blind arcade at the apex. Flanking buttresses carry moulded detail at the first stage. Above sits a broad three-part window with a wide two-light traceried centre and glazed trefoil in the gablehead. Flanking bays each contain a two-light window in a pointed-arch frame. The tower stands to the outer right.

The tower's engaged first stage features a moulded doorway to the northeast, followed by a stepped and battered dividing course adjoining three-stage angle buttresses. The second stage contains a narrow central light to the northeast and a narrow bipartite light to the northwest, giving way to a corbelled, rectangular-plan, two-part louvered opening that pierces a mutuled cornice and rises into a pedimented clock face on each elevation. A set-back, finalled octagonal spire surmounts this, with a tiny fleche to alternate faces close to the apex.

The southeast elevation displays five regularly-disposed bays, each with a tall two-light window and dividing buttresses. A voussoired, roll-moulded, pointed-arch doorway with flanking buttresses creates a small porch. A glazed rooflight and two diminutive roof ventilators sit close to the ridge.

The southwest rear elevation is gabled, with a tall traceried lancet to the right, a pointed-arch opening high at the centre, and a gablehead stack. A low piend-roofed vestry projection with a door and two windows adjoins the Church Hall beyond. Steps descend to a basement boiler room.

Glazing throughout features largely diamond-pattern leaded glass with some coloured glass and margin glazing to traceried windows, and small pane glazing patterns in timber sash and case windows. Grey slates with fishscale bands clad the spire. Ashlar-coped skews with moulded skewputts complete the external detail. Cast-iron downpipes with decorative rainwater hoppers are fitted throughout.

The interior contains a raked gallery with simply carved panelled front on cast-iron columns to the east. Simple fixed timber pew benches occupy the nave, with some box pews at the gallery and alternate pews fitted with cast-iron umbrella stands. A broad-span timber-lined hammerbeam roof spans the church. The vestibule holds a carved stone font, decoratively-panelled doors, and a cantilevered winding staircase with decorative cast-iron balusters. Marble, timber, and bronze mural monuments, including First World War memorials, are mounted within. Aisle doors lead to the body of the church, where a dominant carved organ housing to the west incorporates a lectern at its centre, flanked by pointed-arch doors with traceried windows beyond. A carved pulpit and font are also present. A tower clock dated 1869 by a Blairgowrie maker is displayed.

The Church Hall is a rectangular-plan structure with slated rubble walls, decorative bargeboarding, decorative ironwork finials, and boarded timber doors. The southwest elevation features a centre bay with a raised-centre tripartite window in an over-arched frame, with timber doors to flanking pitch-roofed porches with raised ashlar base courses. The northeast elevation contains a square-headed window to the centre, a low projecting vestry to the right, and a blocked door to the left. The southeast elevation has a door and three small windows grouped toward the outer right. Internally, the hall features boarded dadoes, boarded doors with decorative ironwork furniture serving the vestry, and panelled doors. Timber fire surrounds are fitted, along with a large four-part folding door and open-timbered roof space with metalwork braces.