Church of St Catherine

Church of St Catherine

A large geometrical style church of considerable architectural distinction, comprising an aisled nave with western porch, chancel with transepts, and a tall tower and spire attached to the south aisle. The building is constructed of snecked rock-faced sandstone with lighter freestone dressings and has a slate roof behind coped gables. The nave and chancel feature moulded eaves cornices, and cast iron rainwater heads dated 1868 in relief run along both structures. The boarded doors throughout are fitted with ornate cast iron strap hinges.

The five-bay nave is lit by circular plate tracery windows in the clerestory. The aisles feature, in the two right-hand bays, two-light geometrical windows and are supported by buttresses. The tower occupies the bay set back from the west end of the south aisle, flanking which are single aisle windows with circular tracery heads.

The four-stage tower and spire is the dominant feature in the Pontypridd townscape. It is characterised by set-back buttresses to the lower three stages. The lower stage was originally the porch. The south side doorway displays two orders of shafts with foliage capitals, the shafts continuing into the arch as roll mouldings. A tympanum with a moulded string course sits above the shouldered lintel. Above the arch is a niche with cusped arch, flanking shafts carrying pinnacles and a crocketed gable, all corbelled out slightly. The niche contains a figure of St Catherine. The west and east faces each have three narrow windows in the lower stage. At the northwest angle is a segmental-headed doorway providing access to the stair turret. The second and third stages contain small narrow windows with a string course below the upper stage. This upper stage has two-light belfry windows in each face, featuring two orders of nook shafts and hoods with foliage stops and louvres. The belfry windows are recessed beneath an arcaded frieze, to the centre of which pairs of shafts are carried up and turn to pinnacles flanking gabled clock faces, which project from the spire like lucarnes. The clocks have round faces. Beneath the tall splay-footed spire is a moulded cornice.

The shallow south transept, which houses the organ, is lower than the chancel and has a stone end stack to the ridge. It features a circular plate tracery window and a doorway with shouldered lintel, lower left, beneath a cusped tympanum with a cross in relief. The right side wall contains a two-light window with transom. The lower and narrower chancel has set-back buttresses with gablets to the offsets and a string course to sill level. The south and north walls each have a single lancet, while the east window is three-light.

A north vestry was added in 1915 with a two-light north window flanked by lancets and three stepped vents below the apex. The doorway is on the west side, projecting in front of the north aisle, and has a two-centred head. A foundation tablet is positioned to its left. The north aisle has two-light windows and buttresses, while the nave clerestory windows match those on the south side. Both aisles have two-light west windows, with a four-light west window to the nave. Below the nave west window is an added porch executed in similar style to the remainder. A foundation tablet appears in the west wall. The west doorway has two orders of shafts carried up as roll mouldings in the arch. The south doorway has a shouldered lintel below and an arched tympanum with a cross in relief. The roof is concealed by a parapet of circles with blind quatrefoils.

The base of the tower was the original porch. Its three-light side windows have round colonnettes under shouldered lintels. The south doorway is cusped and heavily moulded with three orders of nook shafts, foliage capitals and moulded arch. The double south doors have elaborate strap hinges.

The interior is remarkable for its polychrome treatment. The walls are faced with red brick but with black-brick patterning, including crosses, stars of David and plain banding, and pale stone bands. The nave arcades have round piers alternately with crocket capitals and square abaci in early French style, alongside moulded capitals. The arches display red and black brick and Bath stone dressings, creating a rich polychrome effect, enhanced further by cut brick zigzags. The tall narrow chancel arch is similarly detailed but richer, with foliage friezes and trails. Its inner order stands on pairs of short marble shafts on corbels with crocket capitals. Alpha and Omega are inscribed in black brick roundels to the spandrels. The clerestory windows have polychrome segmental rere arches and sill bands. Both the nave and chancel have roofs of closely-spaced arched braces. The nave west doorway, of 1933, has a two-centred arch and double half-lit doors.

The chancel features a marble floor reached by steps, added by Scott in 1919. The east window has a moulded rere arch on attached shafts with annulets and crocket capitals, and a hood mould with head stops.

The font has a moulded square bowl with round panels bearing relief carvings of a cross, Alpha and Omega and the IHS monogram. It stands on a thin square pedestal surrounded by outer rows of detached shafts which are alternately round and polygonal. The pulpit, dated 1919, is polygonal with blind Gothic tracery panels. The benches are plain. The choir stalls have panelled ends and front with a canopied back beneath open Gothic cresting. The priests' stalls beneath the chancel arch feature similar canopies and cresting. The chancel contains a reredos of the Last Supper, part of Scott's modifications in 1919.

Numerous windows retain stained glass of considerable importance. The principal and most significant scheme comprises five windows in the north aisle dating to approximately 1901-12, one of which is signed by R J Newbery of London. The sequence narrates scenes from the history of the Church in Wales, beginning with Christ calling for the word to be preached to the Gentiles, followed by Caratacus imprisoned at Rome, St Illtyd teaching Padarn, Catwg, Teilo and David, British bishops at the Council of Arles in 314, St David preaching at Llandewi Brefi, the visit of St Augustine, Archbishop Baldwin preaching the Crusades, William Morgan distributing the Welsh Bible, the Boer War and the mission to Africa. The tracery lights display the arms of the four dioceses of Wales—Bangor, Llandaff, St Asaph and St David—and the archdiocese of Canterbury.

The nave west window commemorates the Great War, showing the patron saints George, Andrew, Patrick and David above Bible scenes depicting David and Goliath, Samson with the jaw bone of an ass, Moses, and the Walls of Jericho. The chancel north and south windows, both dated 1923, show Saints Catherine and Cecilia. The east window is entitled The Good Shepherd and contains several New Testament scenes. In the south aisle at the east end are two windows also with New Testament scenes, both probably by Newbery: one, dated 1898, shows the Ascension and Crucifixion, while the other, of 1903, depicts 'Suffer the Children' and Christ in the Temple. Other undated windows show the Nativity, 'Suffer the Children', the Visitation of the Archangel Gabriel in the west window, and the Nativity in the north aisle west window.