Description

Joseph Aloysius Hansom (London) 1865. Remarkable gothic revival church and asymmetrical presbytery, rubble-built with ashlar dressings.

a) CHURCH: domdinated by octagonal 5 chancel tower. 5 tall and 2 short cusp-traceried windows with clasping buttresses, flying as base. Loer stage of tower battered. Facetted stumpy spire with bands of fish-scale slates and wrought-iron finial. Lady chapel to W, semi-circular apse with 6 cusped lights and semi-conical roof, traceried window in W gable. Side elevations: steep slate roofs, row of clerestory lights to nave, and small paired windows to aisles divided by buttresses rising from battered base.

N gable central buttress with niche, blind arcade at ground altered to doors. 2 hoodmoulded lights and 2 quatrefoils over. Timber bellcote at apex. Porch at NW with original pointed arched hoodmoulded door, clasping buttress and 1 bay W gable. Semi-octagonal projection at E with small geometric traceried windows, facetted roof and wrought-iron finial. INTERIOR: notable constructional polychromy. Grey stone piers carry yellow brick arcades with red sandstone bands engaged shafts support steep timber arch-braced roof trusses. Lean-to roofs in aisles. Side walls: low blind arcaded corbel table with stations of the cross. Dark nave contrasts with well-lit chancel having a high prisimatic roof, stained glass, and flamboyant after piece by A B Wall of Cheltenham, 1897. Similar altar in arcaded Lady Chapel. Lower parts of side walls, Lady Chapel and blind arcade in chancel unfortunately hidden by modern wooden panels. Enlarged gallery and later organ at rear.

b) Large 2-storey PRESBYTERY, asymmetrically aligned to High Street, with few right-angles.

Plane to High Street has large pointed arched entrance in simply carved surround with flanking quatrefoils and 2-light openings. Canted bay facing aspe of church 2-bays to E recessed at 1st floor with central wedge. Ground floor shouldered arched door. Main ground floor windows have segmental arched transom bearing mullion to upper, painted, part 1st floor single light transomed and cross windows, some with modern glazing. Gothic dormers to rear elevation, one with mullion missing. Slate roof, 4 stacks (1 rebuilt, 1 missing).

Interior somewhat altered, but tudor chimneypieces and a panelled ceiling survive.

Statement of Interest

An ecclesiastical building in use as such. Hansom was one of a few noted English Roman Catholic architects of the Pugin school. He also produced the design for the original Hansom Cabs. Originally "the Church of the Immaculate Conception", Dundee's third Roman Catholic Church.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q17575666

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

• 
  Oxfordshire: North and West (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Georgian Style and Design for Contemporary Living
• 
  Oxfordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  This Old House: Restoring, Rehabilitating, and Renovating an Older House
• 
  Old House Eco Handbook: A Practical Guide to Retrofitting for Energy-Efficiency & Sustainability
• 
  Hampshire: Winchester and the North (The Buildings of England) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)