Description

728/2/108 ROCKINGHAM ROAD
14-APR-1976 (East side)
ST ANDREW'S CHURCH

II
Church. 1869 in the Decorated style to the designs of G E Street, contractors Barlow and Butlin. Choir vestry of 1900. N aisle added in 1925 as a First World War memorial, in a sympathetic style, to the designs of Blackwell and Riddy of Kettering, cost £4,300. Chancel refurbishment of 1949. NE chapel completed in 1953. Squared masonry brought to course; stone slate roofs, N aisle wall partly brick. Plan of nave with N and S aisles; chancel with transeptal SE organ chamber and choir vestry; SW porch; bell turret built off the ground in the valley between the nave and the S aisle. There were plans to complete the N aisle with a NE vestry, but these were not executed and the 2-bay arcade to the proposed vestry is blocked off externally with a brick wall.
EXTERIOR: Chamfered strings. The chancel has E buttresses with gables, a 5-light E window with Geometric Decorated tracery and two 2-light traceried N windows. The nave has W end buttresses and a 4-light Decorated traceried W window above a cinquefoil-headed doorway. The aisles have 2-light W windows. The S aisle is buttressed with 2 windows per bay, the eastern bay windows larger with more elaborate tracery. There is very limited external visual access to the N aisle. The E wall has a shallow, gabled, brick projection containing a traceried window. The SE transept has a 3-light traceried S window and a doorway on the W side which also has a pair of trefoil-headed windows in a square frame. There are 3 similar windows to the E wall of the transept which also has a high-set demi-window containing 3 quatrefoils. The SW porch has a narrow 2-centred doorway with a chamfered doorway. Curiously-positioned belfry, rising from a low point in the roof, has trefoil-headed openings and 4 gables to the ashlar masonry spire.
INTERIOR: Unplastered ashlar masonry. Moulded chancel arch on corbels. Arcades with double-chamfered arches on octagonal piers without capitals, the mouldings dying into the piers. The 1925 N arcade is designed to match the arcade on the S. Substantial arch-braced roof to the nave with tracery between the principal rafters and the collars. There are ashlar pieces between the purlins and the common rafters. Common rafter arch-braced roof to the chancel. The belfry rises from the floor as an octagonal structure. Altar with oak riddel posts and communion rail of 1949. Trefoil-headed sedilia on shafts. Encaustic tiles to the chancel. Original choir stalls with poppyhead ends and open fronts. Polygonal timber pulpit designed by Leslie T Moore and given in 1929. It has blind traceried sides on a wineglass stem. The pulpit has a tester. 1870 font with an octagonal bowl with blind traceried sides on an octagonal stem. 1895 chairs in the nave. E window, 1906, and one window in the S aisle, both by Kempe. Two 1920s William Morris and Co windows in the N aisle.
SUMMARY OF IMPORTANCE:
Although this church was originally designed by the distinguished architect G.E.Street in 1869 it was not one of his outstanding churches, and, as well as this, the large extension of 1925 was not a significant addition and was never completed. Most of the fittings date from after the original building of the church and are not of outstanding quality in themselves. The church is, however, undoubtedly a building of special architectural interest fulfilling the criteria for C19 buildings as being 'of definite quality and character'.

Sources.
Cullup, N., A Brief Guide to the Parish Church of St Andrew the Apostle, Kettering, 2001.
Pevsner, Northamptonshire, 1973 edn., 272.
Signed plans by Blackwell and Riddy of Kettering, kept in the church.

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26653727

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.

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