Church of St Paul

Church of St Paul

A Gothic revival parish church comprising a nave, chancel, north-west steeple containing a porch, and north vestry. The building is constructed of snecked grey stone with sandstone dressings, roofed in slate. The windows feature Geometrical tracery throughout.

The exterior displays a moulded plinth, sill band, plain eaves cornice, and angle buttresses with offsets. Most windows are composed of two cusped lights and a cinquefoil in plate tracery beneath a pointed arch, with hoodmoulds terminated by foliate end stops.

The two-stage tower supports a broach spire. The lower stage has set-back buttresses and a pointed-arched doorway to the north side featuring three orders of mouldings, the central ones carried on attached shafts with ringed capitals and bases enriched with dog-tooth decoration. The doorway contains double planked doors with iron strap hinges. Above it are a pair of cusped lancets, with a single cusped lancet to the west face. The upper stage rises from offsets and is narrower than the lower, displaying a Lombard frieze. Each face contains a two-light louvre opening in plate tracery matching the window style, though without end stops to the hoodmoulds. The spire has a lucarne to each face and is topped with a finial and weather vane.

The north side of the nave contains three plate-traceried windows separated by buttresses. The chancel is notably lower and narrower than the nave. To the right stands a gabled vestry with a basement storey. A chamfered pointed-arched doorway appears in the north gable end beneath a hoodmould, with three steps leading to a planked door. The gable has raised copings and kneelers, with an end stack supporting two polygonal dressed stone shafts. The east side of the vestry features a pair of cusped lancets, in front of which stone steps descend to the basement. To the left is a planked door with a Tudor-arched head and chamfer, with a small window in the same style to its right. To the left of the vestry, the chancel displays a pair of cusped lancets with hoodmould bearing foliate end stops. The east end has clasping buttresses and an ornate cross finial at the gable apex. A three-light east window in bar tracery contains a large sexfoil flanked by two trefoils.

The south side of the chancel has two windows matching those on the north side, separated by a buttress. The nave's south side displays three windows as on the north side with intervening buttresses, plus a single cusped lancet at the far right. The asymmetrical west end features an angle buttress between tower and nave, and another at the centre of the gable. Between these stands a lean-to baptistery with a two-light window beneath a gablet. Above the lean-to is a shallow-arched opening containing a cinquefoil above two trefoils in plate tracery. To the right of the lean-to is a tall window matching others in the building. In the gable apex is a circular window containing a cusped sexfoil.

Interior

The nave has a six-bay arch-braced roof on moulded corbels. The chancel arch displays two orders of chamfer, the inner order on moulded capitals, with a hoodmould terminated by foliage stops. The chancel employs closely-spaced scissor-braced trusses. In the west wall of the nave, adjacent to the north doorway, is a segmental arched recess with two small windows lighting the font.

The octagonal font bowl is decorated with alternate quatrefoils and trefoils, with a stem of clustered shafts featuring moulded capitals and bases. The pews have moulded straight-headed ends, while the choir stalls and priest's stall are fitted with poppy heads. The polygonal wooden pulpit features blind cusped arches containing quatrefoils in the spandrels.

The west window contains Victorian stained glass bearing a coat of arms and dated 1853, restored by Linley Glass Studios. Three additional windows contain stained glass from the 1990s, all by W Wilson of Linley Glass Studios. The east window, dating to around 1990, depicts Christ in Heaven. A window in the south wall of the nave shows 'Suffer the Children' and dates from around 1996, while the north wall window displays the shipwreck of St Paul, dating from around 1992.