Church of Saint Mary

Church of Saint Mary

Anglican parish church built in red sandstone rubble with slate roofs. The thick greyish slates cover the nave and chancel, while North Wales slates are used on the tower. The building comprises a short west tower, a nave with north and south porches and an east bellcote, and a chancel with lean-to recesses.

The broad west tower has a splayed plinth and chamfered top moulding. A long west flat-headed traceried 2-light window was replaced in 1904 but retains an older relieving arch. The tower is otherwise plain and capped with an earlier 19th-century close-eaved half-hipped slate roof. Small black brick vents are positioned to the west and east. A projecting northeast stair tower has two loops, with slates carried down over them.

The nave features a rough stone east bellcote with two piers, a slab lintel and shallow gable, early 20th-century overhanging eaves, and grey stone flat-headed recessed 2-light windows with cusped heads to the lights—two on each side—flanking central gabled medieval porches. Both porches have pointed arches with heavy stone voussoirs. The north porch is larger, built with squared red sandstone blocks and large grey blocks to the door surround, with a coped gable. A north doorway was infilled with an early 20th-century cusped lancet. The south porch contains a panelled 19th-century door. On the north side, the right window sits in a small slate-roofed square projection. On the south side, the second window has an old stone relieving arch above, and the walling to the right of the porch splays out at the base.

The lower chancel has projecting bays on each side with the roof carried down over them, each containing a restored 15th-century cusped lancet in yellow limestone. Similar grey stone lancets appear in the second bay on each side. The east end has a 15th-century yellow limestone 3-light Perpendicular-style pointed window with hoodmould and panel tracery, topped by a coped east gable.

Within the south porch lies the original south door, a pointed chamfered opening with alternate red and grey blocks to the surround. A stone memorial plaque is set on the west side wall. The tower interior has a plastered pointed medieval vault with shallow large pointed recesses on the north and south walls.

The nave interior contains a 1904 arch-braced collar-rafter roof and painted plastered walls with quarry tiles to the floor. An arched panelled 1904 door to the tower stair is positioned on the west end to the right of the tower arch. A broad cambered-headed recess precedes the first north window. The former north porch, now used as a vestry, has a cambered arched head with an arched 1904 door. The porch interior features a medieval plastered pointed vault, and a tomb recess to the right with a broad segmental-pointed head and a 14th-century funeral slab. Cambered-headed reveals appear to the second north window and both south windows and the south door.

Two small carved medieval corbels sit one above each porch—a mitred head to the south and a crowned female head to the north. A plastered pointed narrow chancel arch leads into the chancel. Two white marble steps descend to the chancel floor, which is laid with white tiles with diagonally-set black squares in the corners. The chancel has an arch-braced collar-rafter roof. The walls have been stripped of plaster, revealing cambered broad arches to the recesses on each side with stone voussoirs. A white marble step leads to the sanctuary, which contains a stone-lined small recess on the sanctuary north wall, a blocked door on the south wall, and a small piscina.

Fittings include a font similar to that in Rudbaxton, with a tapered square bowl (replaced in the early 20th century) mounted on a medieval scalloped base featuring a medieval circular shaft with roll-mould on a square base. The 1904 fittings comprise dado panelling, pews with moulded edges to bench ends, and an ornate carved pulpit with a canted front and three curved-headed carved panels depicting Saint Mary in the centre with vine and blackberry to the sides. A Gothic leaf-pattern in relief runs below, with similar work on a much smaller scale to the top cornice. Altar rails with arcade on turned balusters appear later in date but may be of 1904. Panelling on the east wall is probably of 1927.

A reredos in unpainted carved oak of 1927, designed by J. Coates Carter, features a centre Virgin and Child in an ogee crocketted niche with rectangular carved panels on each side, each with a segmental cusped arch above and carved spandrels. Pierced carved delicate cresting crowns the work. Folding wings have similar panels and cresting, with carved half-gabled outer pieces to fold over the centre niche. The four carvings depict the Annunciation, Magnificat, Baptism and Resurrection.

A large rood cross of painted carved wood by Francis Stephens, dated 1952, hangs over the chancel arch.

Stained glass includes two chancel side windows of 1957 by Powell of Whitefriars—the Virgin and Child to the north, Saint John to the south—and two of 1992 by Geoffrey Robinson of Bristol—Christ blessing to the north, the Annunciation to the south. The east window contains 19th-century patterned quarries.

Memorials include a 14th-century incised tomb slab in the tomb recess with an incised foliate cross and eroded low-relief head above, possibly on a cushion. A chancel west marble plaque with panelled piers commemorates Mary Holcombe (died 1745), and a scroll plaque records Rev. W. Roch (died 1858). A chancel north brass plaque honours Rev. W. Stradling (died 1901).