Description

ISLINGTON

TQ2986NE ST JOHN'S GROVE
635-1/13/803 (South East side)
20/09/54 St John's Church with St Peter's and
churchyard wall and gates
(Formerly Listed as:
ST JOHN'S GROVE
Church of St John)

GV II*

Anglican church. 1826-28 by Sir Charles Barry. White Suffolk
brick laid in Flemish bond with stone dressings; roof obscured
by parapet. (All directions are ritual.) Chancel and nave
under one roof, north and south aisles, west tower. Gabled
east end with diagonal buttresses ending in pinnacles; east
window with five lights and one transom, and rectilinear
tracery; aisles of seven bays with four-centred-arched windows
of two lights and trefoiled tracery, flanked by buttresses
with one offset; the outer two over Tudor-arched entrances,
the inner five with one transom; the clerestory windows have
segmental-pointed arches with two trefoiled lights under a
hoodmould; west end has pointed-arched entrance under ogee
hoodmould with brattishing, the doors decorated with
rectilinear panelling; lancet window above; the west end as a
whole flanked by diagonal buttresses rising to pinnacles, the
entrance flanked by buttresses which become setback buttresses
at tower level; the first stage of the tower has clocks set in
a square panel with foliage carving, and louvred two-light
openings with rectilinear tracery at the bell stage; embattled
parapet and corner pinnacles. Cast-iron rainwater heads with
trefoiled panels at east and west ends of the north aisle;
parish room of 1874 to east end of south aisle. Walls of white
brick with stone coping to north, west and south sides of the
churchyard; two pairs of iron gates to Holloway Road; gates to
St John's Grove of later date.
INTERIOR: . The plan has been somewhat altered, in that
originally the pulpit, a narrow rank of seats and the font
originally stood in what is now the central aisle; and the
chancel fittings were largely added in c.1900; but the later
fittings are in keeping with the original ones. Shallow
chancel, nave, north and south aisles, galleries to north,
south and west sides, inner and outer vestibules. The walls
are plastered and the outer aisle walls have a low dado with
seating attached.
Sexpartite vault to chancel; reredos and panelling of 1901,
the reredos having two central panels with two slightly canted
narrower wings; the panels divided by engaged columns and
decorated with blank tracery of ogee pattern to the central
panels and a distorted Tudor-arched pattern in the wings; the
wings have painted decoration of 1906; the central panels are
brattished at the top, and the outer columns carry crocketed
finials; the panelling is decorated with blank intersecting
tracery under a deep cove with brattishing above. The floor is
covered with encaustic tiles; brass communion rails of 1877.
Nave arcade of six bays with one further bay, not arcaded,
where the west gallery extends over the inner vestibule; the
arcade has pointed arches with slim vault shafts supporting
the roof trusses, and a horizontal moulding running just above
its apex; the clerestory windows have moulded architraves in
the form of slim columns and an archivolt and the lower part
is blank, decorated with shields set in quatrefoils. The
galleries are carried on the columns of the arcade, and
additionally on slim wooden columns at the west end; they have
panelled fronts decorated with blank ogee tracery. Roof
carried on shallow arched trusses and divided into panels with
lozenge-shaped vents to the centre of each bay.
Choir stalls in the first bay of the nave, of 190l, with
panelled fronts decorated with blank ogee tracery, and
poppyheads to bench ends; organ case in easternmost bay of
north aisle, also of 190l and decorated in keeping with the
chancel panelling; mosaic floor surrounding choir stalls of
1926; oak pulpit resting on a marble base, octagonal in plan
on a single shaft square in plan, decorated with cusped and
ogee tracery and figures of (presumably) the Evangelists; font
at west end, probably of mid-Victorian date, stone, circular
and supported on six squat columns. The pews in nave and
aisles all appear to be the original box pews.

Listing NGR: TQ2969686649

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q17552082

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Listed Buildings: The Law and Practice of History Buildings, Ancient Monuments and Conservation Areas
• 
  Somerset: South and West (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  County Durham (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England) by Elizabeth Williamson Nikolaus Pevsner(1983-03-11)
• 
  Georgian Style and Design for Contemporary Living
• 
  Building Small Projects (New Best of Fine Woodworking)
• 
  Northamptonshire: Buildings of England Series (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)