Catholic Church of St Joseph including attached presbytery

Church in Decorated Gothic style. Squared and irregular coursed cream-coloured sandstone with red sandstone dressings and slate roof. Linear E-W plan with NW corner tower. Porch in base of the tower, nave, N and S aisles, polygonal apsed sanctuary and side chapels. Stepped buttresses, moulded string courses. Steeply gabled west front with 4-light traceried pointed window within deeply moulded arch. Similar arch below to W door with flanking paired granite shafts, double doors with strap hinges. Tower with angle buttresses, moulded surround to door in N face and above niche with white marble statue of St Joseph. Top stage of tower with tall lancet windows. N and S aisles with cusped 2-light windows with hood moulds and 3-light flat headed windows to clerestory above. Each aisle terminates at the east end in a chapel with steeply pitched roof and coped gables with cross finials. Traceried 2-light windows with quatrefoils to the gables of the chapels and the apsidal sanctuary.

Presbytery attached via single storeyed link at SE. Domestic gothic style, using the same materials as the church: cream sandstone with red sandstone dressings including pointed relieving arches to windows. A large building, 2 storeyed with attic, essentially comprising an L-plan with advanced gable facing Conwy Road, and entrance in hipped roof block in the angle of the two ranges. Large canted bay window in advanced gable, with paired sashes above and single window to attic. Arched doorway with similar sash windows above and to right.

Tall 5-bay nave with pointed arches on polished red granite columns to aisle arcades. Roof of arch-braced trusses on corbels. Sanctuary roof of timber with stencilled decoration in spandrels. Chapels with elaborate carved stone altar: N Sacred Heart of Jesus by Cusack; S Our Lady by Boultons of Cheltenham, both 1900-01; high altar in similar style with intact marble altar screen. Choir and organ gallery at W, above the narthex separated from the nave by an original timber and glass screen. Baptistry at SW, now in use as a repository. Organ, from Jerusalem Chapel in Penmaenmawr by Peter Conacher and Co of Huddersfield, rebuilt by George Sixsmith in 1995. Six stained glass windows of 1912 by Harry Clarke in the S aisle. Other stained glass in sanctuary of 1925, artist unknown. S chapel with tablet in a Gothic frame dedicated to John Joseph Lennon, Rector of St Gregory’s Weld Bank, Chorley, died 12 October 1897.

Interior of Presbytery retains original fittings including 5-panel doors, deep architraves and skirtings, slate and marble fireplaces, entrance lobby with screen, dog leg stair with turned balusters, chamfered newels, and mahogany panelling.