Description

TQ 3579 ALBION STREET

636/11/10097 No.33
The Finnish Church
Including attached Tower

GV II

Seamen's mission, now a community centre and church. 1956-58 by Cyril Mardall of Yorke, Rosenberg and Mardall. Portland stone cladding; reinforced concrete; black slate cladding to tower. Very low pitched roof, covering not visible. 3-storey front block with double-height church behind front rooms, the church opening into a reading room at ground level and a dining room at first floor (gallery) level. Living quarters to top storey. Tower attached to the left side at the rear. Six bay front, five bays being grouped together in a pattern of fully glazed openings in a Portland stone-clad frame. Metal framed windows of 2 unequal lights, with grey spandrel panels below right and individual vertical metal balustrades below left, above ground floor. Further bay separated and recessed to the right, with vertical metal balconies at both levels. Left return to rear a six stage tower, with solid sides hung in grey slate, and open stages to front and rear above a closed ground floor. Vertical metal slats to top stage, and low pitched roof.
Interior with double height church with gallery to liturgical west and south, liturgical east wall clad in green riven slate flags with an inscribed cross. Square-headed windows at upper and lower levels to north side. Simple sanctuary raised by a step with thick light timber alter table supported on matching stone uprights. Original altar rail of black metal with delicate twig and leaf pattern. Original organ in gallery on south side. Timber folding screen of dark hardwood veneer at west end beneath gallery, opening onto reading room. This has freestanding stone fireplace with a staircase climbing around the stack (which rises 2 storeys) in 2 flights at a non-orthogonal angle. Similar folding screen at gallery level, can separate social areas from church. Simple balustrade of black metal verticals and timber hand rail. Basement sauna by Mardall's architect wife, June Park.
An attractive modern building and a well designed example of an unusual building type.

Listing NGR: TQ3527379692

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• The Finnish Church Including Attached Tower official website
• Wikidata Q26657148

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

• 
  Lancashire: Manchester and the South-East (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Period Property Manual (New Ed)
• 
  Development and Design of Heritage Sensitive Sites: Strategies for Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas
• 
  For the Record
• 
  The Listed Buildings and Other Principal Structures at the Royal Gunpowder Mills Waltham Abbey
• 
  Suffolk: East (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)