Church of St Mary

Church of St Mary

This parish church, erected in 1866, is based on French High-Gothic style and comprises a nave with lower and narrower chancel, a south porch-tower with spire, a north-east organ chamber with sacristy, and a north-west vestry.

The exterior walls are constructed of snecked rock-faced stone with red sandstone banding. Red sandstone is also used to create patterned arch heads. The slate roof features three bands of lighter grey slates and iron finials to the chancel and organ chamber, behind coped gables on moulded kneelers. The cast iron rainwater goods are partly original; one rainwater head on the north side bears the date 1866.

The two-stage porch-tower has set-back east and west buttresses. The south entrance is notable for one order of broad ringed nook shafts with crocket capitals and a stilted two-centred arch with roll moulding. The tympanum displays sculpture of the Ascension in high relief. Inside the porch is a double-chamfered segmental-pointed nave south doorway with boarded door and strap hinges. The south and east tower walls contain two-light belfry openings with red sandstone colonettes and crocket capitals, cusped plate tracery, and louvres. Above the tower, the freestone spire becomes octagonal and is broken by a belvedere with squat broad colonettes, above which is a cornice of punched decoration. Lucarnes in the cardinal directions feature similar decoration, and the spire is further enriched with two bands of shallow arcaded frieze.

The nave and chancel feature geometrical bar tracery. The west window is three-light with cusped wheel tracery. The nave south wall has a single-light window to the left of the tower, and a two-light and one-light window to the right. The nave has buttresses at each end. The chancel south wall has a two-light window with red sandstone colonnette. The east end comprises a polygonal apse with single-light north-east and south-east windows, and a higher two-light east window under a gablet. The north organ chamber has a hipped roof, boarded east door with strap hinges, and an external north stack reduced to eaves level, with a west window under a shouldered lintel. The nave north wall has a two-light window to the left, then a buttress, one-light and two-light windows, and a gabled north vestry with a pair of pointed lights in its gable end.

The interior of the nave features a four-bay roof with scissor trusses with posts carried on foliage-enriched corbels, and a plastered ceiling between the rafters. The elaborate two-centred chancel arch has short polished granite shafts on foliage-enriched corbels with crocket capitals, continued as an impost band, and two orders of roll mouldings. The inner order carries a painted inscription. The arch is spanned by a rood beam. A stone screen base has a brass plaque commemorating the consecration in 1866. In the north-west corner of the nave is a boarded vestry door under a shouldered lintel.

The chancel features a boarded polygonal wagon roof with moulded ribs and cornice. On the north side is a segmental pointed arch to the organ chamber with painted inscription; its right-hand respond has a polished granite shaft on a high freestone base with crocket capital. To its right is a doorway to a former small sacristy behind the organ, recessed in a pointed opening with blank tympanum and enriched shouldered lintel. The organ chamber has a polygonal boarded ceiling with moulded ribs.

The chancel floor is laid with decorative tiles. The sanctuary has a dado of decorative tiles and a Caen stone reredos in 13th-century French style. Its gabled central panel has finials and depicts the Last Supper in high relief, flanked by outer Venetian-style mosaic panels depicting the Agnus Dei and Pelican of Piety. The panels are framed by squat marble shafts and crocket capitals. On the north side is an aumbry with arched head and low-relief cross in the tympanum. On the south-east side is a window seat.

The round freestone font has a contemporary wooden cover with ironwork. An inscription band around the bowl, broken by roundels with low-relief crosses in the cardinal directions, reads in raised letters: 'Suffer little children to come unto me and forbid them not for such is the kingdom of Heaven'. The font stands on a central and four detached shafts with crocket capitals, and a square base. Pews have shaped ends. The freestone polygonal pulpit has ringed shafts and lower-relief diaper panels. Choir stalls have open arcaded fronts and ends with stylised poppy heads. The communion rail has iron uprights with elaborate scroll brackets and wooden rail.

Near the west end of the nave south wall is a grave slab of circa 1200 with foliated cross commemorating 'Mabli', an abbot of Cwmhir, excavated from the abbey in 1824–5. The nave west wall has a tablet to Sir Hans Fowler (died 1771), a marble inscription tablet in a surround with cartouche to the apron. To its left is a wall tablet to Thomas Fowler comprising a marble sarcophagus with inscription (date illegible) on a slate background, designed by Bacon of London and made by S. Manning. The nave north wall has a World War I memorial plaque. In the east wall of the nave, on the south side of the chancel arch, is a brass plaque to George Philips (died 1886) of The Hall.

The glass in the chancel is by Heaton Butler & Bayne in Pre-Raphaelite style. The east window depicts the Crucifixion and Resurrection, with Christ in Majesty in the tracery lights, flanked by Christ as the Good Shepherd and Christ as the Light of the World. The south window shows the Baptism of Christ and the Agony in the Garden. The west window is by Clayton & Bell and depicts the Nativity, the boy Jesus at the Temple, and the Last Supper in the main lights, with the 12 Apostles and Mary Magdalene in the wheel tracery. The north and south windows in the nave have coloured tracery lights.