Description

BIRKENHEAD

SJ38NW BIDSTON ROAD, Oxton
789-1/4/217 (East side)
28/03/74 Church of St Saviour

GV II*

Parish church. 1889-92. By C.W. Harvey and Pennington and
Bridgen. Rock-faced red sandstone with Welsh slate roof.
Decorated style. Cruciform plan with nave, crossing tower,
transepts and chancel. High 5-light Decorated west window with
sill band and hood mould. South door in gabled porch. Lean to
aisle with 8 lancet windows, with continuous hood mould. Four
3-light Decorated windows in clerestorey, divided by pilaster
buttresses. Two 2-light Decorated windows with rose window
over in transept. Small shouldered doorway to vestry to east.
Tower rises for 2 stages above the body of the church: angle
buttresses terminate as octagons in the upper stage and are
capped by pinnacles. Larger octagon in south east corner is
stair turret. Paired bell-chamber lights in upper stage, with
plate tracery and louvres, divided by pilaster terminating in
slender pinnacle. Embattled parapet. Single rose window in
east wall of chancel, rebuilt following war damage. North wall
similar to south, though interupted by added hall complex.
Interior: exposed brick with stone dressings. Nave arcade of 4
bays with single chamfered arches with hood moulds.
Clerestorey with moulded brick rere-arches and corbelled
cornice. Braced principal trusses carried on stone shafts
springing from corbels. Keeled and boarded roof. Passage
aisles with longitudinal arches. Intricately carved screen to
west by Edward Rae or Edgar Gladstone Heath. Octagonal
polished marble font with figures to cardinal points. Light
fittings to nave with octagonal open-work lanterns with
spirelets and pendants. Chancel screen with integral pulpit
and lecturn, said to be by Edward Rae. Intricately worked
screen and gates with open Perpendicular style panelling with
marquetry work in base and carved traceried canopy over with
marquetry inlay and rich foliate frieze. Sounding boards over
pulpit and lectern. Choir stalls also inlaid with marquetry on
frontals and backs. Vine band over base panels, poppy heads
and misericords. Main stalls to south have intricate canopies
over. Inscription records that the stalls were designed and
carved by Edgar Gladstone Heath, and they are dated 1915.
Stone sedilia with piscina in simple trefoil headed arches.
East wall with linen-fold panelling. Large tripartite reredos
with wings, by G.F. Bodley dated 1907. Gilded wood work
incoporating classical and gothic allusions and representing
Christ in Majesty and the Nativity, with angels in the wings.
Communion rails also richly carved woodwork with small densley
textured traceried panels. Wood side altar in transept, with
canopied niches containing figures of saints. Stained glass:
West window a memorial to George Rae, by Morris and Company,
1902, Faith, Hope, Truth and Prayer, figures on a foliate
ground. Figures of saints in aisle and windows. North transept
window also by Morris and Company, 1903, saints, prophets and
angels. Kempe and Tower glass in south window of chancel. A
good church with an exceptional collection of early C20
furnishings.
(The Buildings of England: Pevsner N and Hubbard E: Cheshire:
Harmondsworth: 1971-).

Listing NGR: SJ3014887790

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• St Saviour's Church, Oxton at Wikipedia
• St Saviour's Church, Oxton official website
• Wikidata Q15979506

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

• 
  London 6: Westminster (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England): Westminster v. 6
• 
  Northumberland (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Pioneers of Modern Design: From William Morris to Walter Gropius (Penguin Art & Architecture)
• 
  Old House Care and Repair
• 
  Huddersfield in 50 Buildings
• 
  Hertfordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)