Y Priordy Independent Chapel

Y Priordy Independent Chapel is a Romanesque-style chapel dating from 1875, constructed in rock-faced sandstone with Bath stone detailing and alternating voussoirs of rock-faced grey limestone to the openings. The roof is slate with leaded glazing throughout, and features steep hipped mansard roofs with crested ridges on bracketed ashlar eaves, iron cross finials, and ridge crestings.

The front of the chapel is gable-fronted, two storeys high and three bays wide. The slightly advanced central bay is stepped, featuring blind arcading to the gable with a centre vent composed of nine arches, where only the central three have jambs. The first floor has a large, stepped three-light window with two column shafts with carved capitals between the lights. The larger central light has three roundels to the head and a round arched light below, while the shorter, narrower flanking lights have single roundels to the heads. An impost band runs to quoined piers on each side of the window, with a sill course below. The entrance, located below within the same quoined piers, has single lights flanking a broad arched doorway with column shafts and carved capitals, arched heads to the lights, and a wider, similar arch to the centre. Panelled timber doors are beneath an ashlar tympanum with three pierced florets and the inscription "Priory Congregational Church" in incised letters, with the date “1875” on one floret. The side bays have tall arched openings with a single arched light and a roundel over, and a blind roundel above with an ashlar trefoil. Ashlar quoins define all corners. Two-storey sides have four windows each, with paired arched-headed lights above and paired segmental-arched lights below, using alternating colour voussoirs. Cast iron rainwater goods are visible. A basement storey is present beneath the main structure. The rear gable is coped, with a small iron finial.

Inside, a three-sided raked gallery with wide curved angles features vertical boarding panels beneath narrow ironwork bands and Gothic trefoils. Iron columns support the gallery; the lower sections are fluted with small raised bands, while the upper sections spiral with classical capitals. The chapel has pitch-pine box pews angled to face a large pulpit, with vertical slats to the pew backs. The pitch pine pulpit platform has a three-bay arcaded front with chamfered corner piers with pyramid finials, and a projected centre section. Similar posts are present for the newels of the turned stairs flanking the pulpit and for the corner posts of the deacons’ seat. A very large pipe organ, dating from around 1933, is positioned behind the pulpit on timber brackets, consisting of five sections, with the centre and outer sections lower than the rest. A lobby window with three arched heads contains stained glass by Abbot & Co, Lancaster (depicting “Light of the World”). The ceiling is three-sided, divided into four bays with arch braces on corbels. Four diamond-shaped vents incorporate roundels and stylised flower motifs. Coloured glass depicts a Lamb, a book, and a dove in the façade window. A vestry is located beneath the chapel, supported by six round cast-iron columns with decorated heads.