Description

John Honeyman, 1881-3. Large Early English church. Aisles and clerestoried nave, N transept, vestry to NE, 41m tower to NW. To W, 2-storey plain gabled Hall with Beadle's house behind. Courses stugged sandstone with smooth dressings, stiff-lead capitals, set-back buttresses, hoodmoulded lancets (larger flanked by nook-shafts), 2-tier moulded base course. Moulded eaves.

TOWER: 3-stage. 1st 2 stages with corner buttresses. Pointed arch deeply chamfered doorway to N with nook-shafts and dog-tooth carvings; 2-leaf boarded door. Lancet at ground to W. Small paired lancets to all faces above, hoodmould/string course. 2nd stage with single lancet to E and W faces; pair of lancets between string courses to all faces above. 3rd stage with 1 massive louvred lancet to E face, 2 to others. Corbelled, blind-arcaded parapet. Stair tower in buttress at SE corner with arrowslit windows, octagonal cap-house with colonettes and conical stone roof, giving access to parapet.

N (SLATEFORD ROAD) ELEVATION: tower at right. 4-bay isle, paired lancets divided by buttresses, single lancet at left with door deep-set in advanced pointed-arch gabled panel; nook-shafts; niche in gablehead flanked by quatrefoil roundels. Clerestorey with 3 grouped lancets to each bay, pair at far left; hoodmould course.

TRANSEPT: (contains organ) gabled; stepped 3-light hoodmoulded lancets, nookshafts and cill course, flanked by corner buttresses; cross finial. Pair of hoodmoulded lancets to E. At left, single storey canted vestry projecting to E; doorway to N with roll-moulded cusped surround, oculus above; bipartites or single lancet windows with hoodmould course to each face.

E ELEVATION: gabled; stepped 5-light lancets, outer lights blinded, clustered nook-shafts, blind arcade below with polished granite colonettes. S (HARRISON ROAD) ELEVATION: 5-bay aisle and clerestorey as above; gabled porch to left of final lancet, with door deep-set in 4-pointed arch surround. Lancets on returns of aisle. Further bay at outer left; stepped 3-light lancet windows with relieving arch at ground (lights narthex), clerestorey as above.

W GABLE: pair of tall lancets, oculus above. To right, 2-stage semi-circular stair tower for gallery. Leaded windows. Blue-grey slates with much lichen, red ridge tiles. Plain skews.

INTERIOR: 5-bay hoodmoulded arcade with masque label stops (unidentified) on ashlar columns, taller and richer crossing arch containing fine gothic organ case, organ by Brindley & Foster, 1895. Gallery at rear leading to Session and Store room in tower. Open queenpost roof, braces on carved bosses (mostly foliate, but two with faces). Fine pulpit and lectern painted with fruits of the Bible by Gertrude Hope. Reredos under E window, choirstalls to right (moved from in front of reredos). Original pews, light fittings replaced. Screen under balcony; fielded panelling to doors with leaded, coloured glass lights leading to inner narthex with slightly pitched timber roofs; tiled floor with decorative border; war memorial plaque. Steps down to porch, planked door minutely panelled. Brass plaque to Rev George Wilson, 1st Minister of the church. STAINED GLASS: 3 E lancets by A Ballantine & Gardiner, 1895. At ends of S aisle lights by James Ballantine & Son, 1886; on S side lancet by Douglas Strachan, 1925. HALL: 2-storey rectangular buttressed L-plan hall with gables to N and W; materials as above. N gable with tripartite window at ground, hoodmould course; same at 1st floor, oculus above. To W shouldered windows. Hall at 1st floor with braced wagon roof. Single storey link to church at W (recently extended at rear); door in shouldered frame, small shouldered window. BEADLE'S HOUSE: 2-storey 2-bay house attached to rear of Hall. Single storey porch to W. Materials as above; pyramidal roof.

BOUNDARY WALLS: smooth ashlar squared and snecked wall in tall and short sections with saddleback coping and wrought iron railings between. Octagonal gatepiers with pointed caps to N doors. Large garden to E.

Statement of Interest

Ecclesiastical building in use as such. Built to replace the Iron Church of North Merchiston which stood at the junction of Ardmilland and Angle Park Terraces and was sold and moved to the Royal Edinburgh Hospital in 1884 (where it still stands today). Cross at E end in garden from North Merchiston Church (congregations united when the latter was demolished). The tower was built in two stages, a spire originally being intended. The roof of the original tower is still inside the upper stage. Its Category A status stems from the convincing medieval interior disposition, which is a fine example of ecclesiological planning at the start of the Scoto-Catholic Movement. As such it is an important forerunner of Sir Robert Rowan Anderson's design for Govan.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q17570220

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

• 
  Bedfordshire, Huntingdonshire, and Peterborough (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Oxfordshire: North and West (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Cornwall (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  The Listed Buildings and Other Principal Structures at the Royal Gunpowder Mills Waltham Abbey
• 
  Kent: North East and East (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Pioneers of Modern Design: From William Morris to Walter Gropius (Penguin Art & Architecture)