Capel Quaker Meeting House and Cottage, Capel, Surrey

Summary

Quaker Meeting House built in 1724, with later alterations, and attached C18 cottage with later alterations and extensions.

Description

Quaker Meeting House built in 1724, with later alterations, and attached C18 cottage with later alterations and extensions.

MATERIALS: dressed stone, red brick stretchers and blue headers laid in Flemish bond, clay hanging tiles and roof coverings.

PLAN: L-shaped on plan, with a small lean-to porch in the angle of the two wings. The two-storey cottage forms a north-west to south-east cross wing to the north-east to south-west meeting house (simplified in the following description to north-south and east-west respectively).

EXTERIOR

Meeting house: the meeting house and attached cottage stand to the north side of The Street, set back from the road with Quaker burial plots to the front and rear. The meeting house is oriented east-west with a gabled roof, a lean-to porch to the western bay of the south front, and a small flat-roofed rear extension. The gable and pentice roofs have clay tile coverings and the gable ends are tile-hung. The meeting house south front has a stone plinth and is of three bays comprising, from right to left, two timber casement windows under segmental arches rising to the full height of the meeting room, and the meeting room entrance door accessed through the porch. The porch includes a double-leaf door with side-lights. A small two-light window above the porch lit the former meeting room gallery. Blocked openings in the south front show the original positions of both the entrance and a former window, whilst a weathered stone between the eastern bays may have carried an inscription.

The east wall is blind, with a blocked window under a segmental arch. The rear (north) elevation is obscured at ground floor level by the rendered flat-roofed kitchen and toilet block, which includes from left to right two small windows lighting the toilets, and the larger kitchen window. Entrance doors to the extension are in its side walls. Above, in the upper part of the meeting house wall, are from left to right two short pivoted windows and a larger first floor window over a rear door and ground floor window in the western bay. The meeting house west wall is largely obscured by the attached cottage.

Cottage: the cottage is oriented north-south forming a cross wing to the meeting house. The two-storey gabled south front includes a ground floor four-light square bay window below a first floor three-light casement window. In both windows the lights are subdivided into six subsidiary lights by glazing bars. The first floor is tile-hung. The irregular west elevation comprises, from right to left, the blind return wall of the cottage’s two-storey south bay, a flat-roofed and tile-hung dormer to the centre, and a single-storey lean-to remaining from the original C18 cottage. The dormer bay includes from right to left two ground floor windows and an entrance door, with one first floor window above. The cottage’s rear (north) wall includes a three-light casement window in the lean-to. There is a chimney stack to the west wall of the gabled front, and above the lean-to. The gabled roof to the south and the lean-to pentice roof have clay tile coverings.

INTERIOR: the front porch includes a disused plank door and a leaded two-light window beside the meeting house entrance door, which leads into the meeting room. The meeting room west wall is formed of a full-height timber partition with alternate rows of fixed and moveable panels, formerly dividing the main meeting room from the women’s business room and gallery; those latter spaces now form part of the adjoining cottage. The meeting room has dado panelling to the remaining walls. The east wall includes the Elders’ stand of two fixed benches on a dais, accessed by one step to the north and two to the south. There is a flat ceiling. The door in the west bay of the north wall leads to the burial ground at the rear. The rear extension includes a small kitchen (to the west) and two toilets (to the east). The cottage interior was not inspected.

History

The Quaker movement emerged out of a period of religious and political turmoil in the mid-C17. Its main protagonist, George Fox, openly rejected traditional religious doctrine, instead promoting the theory that all people could have a direct relationship with God, without dependence on sermonising ministers, nor the necessity of consecrated places of worship. Fox, originally from Leicestershire, claimed the Holy Spirit was within each person, and from 1647 travelled the country as an itinerant preacher. 1652 was pivotal in his campaign; after a vision on Pendle Hill, Lancashire, Fox was moved to visit Firbank Fell, Cumbria, where he delivered a rousing, three-hour speech to an assembly of 1000 people, and recruited numerous converts. The Quakers, formally named the Religious Society of Friends, was thus established

Fox asserted that no one place was holier than another, and in their early days, the new congregations often met for silent worship at outdoor locations; the use of members' houses, barns, and other secular premises followed. Persecution of Nonconformists proliferated in the period, with Quakers suffering disproportionately. The Quaker Act of 1662, and the Conventicle Act of 1664, forbade their meetings, though they continued in defiance, and a number of meeting houses date from this early period. Broad Campden, Gloucestershire, came into Quaker use in 1663 and is the earliest meeting house in Britain, although it was out of use from 1871 to 1961. The meeting house at Hertford, 1670, is the oldest to be purpose built. The Act of Toleration, passed in 1689, was one of several steps towards freedom of worship outside the established church, and thereafter meeting houses began to make their mark on the landscape.

Quaker meeting houses are generally characterised by simplicity of design, both externally and internally, reflecting the form of worship they were designed to accommodate. The earliest purpose-built meeting houses were built by local craftsmen following regional traditions and were on a domestic scale, frequently resembling vernacular houses; at the same time, a number of older buildings were converted to Quaker use. From the first, most meeting houses shared certain characteristics, containing a well-lit meeting hall with a simple arrangement of seating. In time a raised stand became common behind the bench for the Elders, so that traveling ministers could be better heard. Where possible, a meeting house would provide separate accommodation for the women’s business meetings, and early meeting houses may retain a timber screen, allowing the separation (and combination) of spaces for business and worship. In general, the meeting house will have little or no decoration or enrichment, with joinery frequently left unpainted. Ancillary buildings erected in addition to a meeting house could include stabling and covered spaces such as a gig house; caretaker’s accommodation; or a school room or adult school.

Throughout the C18 and early C19 many new meeting houses were built, or earlier buildings remodelled, with ‘polite’, Classically-informed designs appearing, reflecting architectural trends more widely. However, the buildings were generally of modest size and with minimal ornament, although examples in urban settings tended to be more architecturally ambitious. After 1800, it became more common for meeting houses to be designed by an architect or surveyor. The Victorian and Edwardian periods saw greater stylistic eclecticism, though the Gothic Revival associated with the Established Church was not embraced; on the other hand, Arts and Crafts principles had much in common with those of the Quakers, and a number of meeting houses show the influence of that movement.

The C20 saw changes in the way meeting houses were used which influenced their design and layout. In 1896 it was decided to unite men’s and women’s business, so separate rooms were no longer needed, whilst from the mid-1920s ministers were not recorded, and consequently stands were rarely provided in new buildings. Seating was therefore rearranged without reference to the stand, with moveable chairs set in concentric circles becoming the norm in smaller meeting houses. By the interwar years, there was a shift towards more flexible internal planning, together with the provision of additional rooms for purposes other than worship, reflecting the meeting house’s community role – the need for greater contact with other Christians and a more active contribution within the wider world had been an increasing concern since the 1890s. Traditional styles continued to be favoured, from grander Classical buildings in urban centres to local examples in domestic neo-Georgian.

Capel Meeting House was built in 1724 on a plot purchased in 1704 for a Quaker burial ground, serving a meeting that had existed since the 1650s. A small lean-to cottage to the west side of the meeting house may have been contemporary, or added in the later-C18. C19 alterations to the meeting house included moving the entrance door from the centre of the south wall to its western bay, and re-fenestration. The attached cottage was enlarged and altered during the C19 and early-C20. It was further extended in the 1970s. At that time a porch was built to the meeting house south wall, enclosing the meeting house and cottage entrances. The small kitchen and toilet block extension to the rear of the meeting house may have been added at that time. The rear chimney stack was reduced in height, with Listed Building Consent, in 2012.

Reasons for Listing

Capel Quaker Meeting House and Cottage, situated on The Street, are listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* as an early C18 Quaker meeting house, its vernacular style typifies the modest nature of these buildings for worship;
* the Elders’ stand, partition with moveable sections, and other historic fabric preserved in the interior provide evidence for the division of space and internal arrangements typical for earlier Quaker meeting houses.

Historic interest:

* as an early purpose-built meeting house dating to 1724, standing in the attached burial ground (in use since 1704).

External Links

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