Anglican Church of St Faith and St Laurence, Quinton, Birmingham

Description

BIRMINGHAM

997/0/10525 CROFTDOWN ROAD AND BALDEN ROAD
23-JUL-09 Anglican Church of St Faith and St Laure
nce

II
An Anglican church in an Arts and Crafts-influenced Romanesque style, designed by P B Chatwin and built in two phases, 1937-8 and 1958-60. The building is prominently located on the corner of Croftdown Road and Balden Lane as part of a planned suburban development in Harborne.

MATERIALS: The church is constructed from soft brown brick, laid in a variation on Flemish Garden Wall bond, with slate roofs, and the interior is a combination of brick and whitewashed concrete.

PLAN: The church is orientated north west-south east, though ritual compass points are used throughout this description. It comprises porch, nave, chancel, west tower, south-east Lady Chapel and north-east vestries, and has a modern church hall and associated facilities to the north.

EXTERIOR: The exterior is in a robust, Romanesque style, the brick elevations set on a moulded brick plinth; there is a brick dentil frieze to the eaves and plain brick pilasters expressing the bay structure of the long elevations. There are round-arched triple lancets to the aisles, and groups of three similar windows with a taller central element to the clerestory. All the windows have surrounds made from concave-moulded brick. The chancel is set slightly below the roof line of the nave. The east end is apsidal, with a string course along the cills of the clerestory windows; the ground floor is rectangular on plan, with a canted first floor, and hipped roofs to the outshuts thus created. The broad, square tower has a pyramidal roof, round-arched openings and diaper work in the upper stage. The main entrance, at the base of the tower, has double plank doors with elaborate scrolled strap hinges, set into a round-arched doorway with stone dressings and a stone-faced tympanum. The attached single-storey vestries are similar in design to the main body of the church. To the north is a later C20 church hall, added in a sympathetic style, largely detached from the church, leaving the north elevation intact. This part of the building is not of special interest.

INTERIOR: The interior is a mixture of brick and plastered concrete; the five-bay arcades are formed from plain, round arches rising from square piers of reinforced concrete. The piers also serve as springers from which rise solid, semicircular diaphragm arches supporting the roof, which is ceiled at collar level, and has applied box decoration. The clerestory windows are set within exposed brick lunettes, and the aisle walls are similary in exposed brick. The west gallery, pews, pulpit and all other timber work are in a warm, light oak. The floors are parquet, apart from those in the porch and narthex, which are red tile. The octagonal stone font is set at the west end of the north aisle. The panelled, octagonal, timber pulpit is set at the foot of the chancel arch on the north side. The chancel has a polygonal east end, supported on a square base, with round arches to the niches thus created, each of which has a small stained glass window. The main windows to the chancel are at clerestory level: short double lancets, with stained glass decoration. The Lady Chapel, to the east end of the south aisle, has stained glass by Hardman, and is divided from the body of the church by part-glazed timber screening. The windows above the altar depict the Nunc Dimittis, The Magnificat and the Holy Family, with side windows showing scenes from the Parables. The aisle windows have stepped brick surrounds with chamfered cills. The windows to the north aisle have stained glass decoration arranged in triptychs depicting scenes from the life of Christ. Those to the south aisle have depictions of saints, including St Faith and St Laurence. The clerestory windows have small, rectangular panes of plain glass with margin glazing, as does the large west window.

SOURCES: Andy Foster, Pevsner Architectural Guides: Birmingham (2007), 186
Nikolaus Pevsner and Alexandra Wedgwood, The Buildings of England: Warwickshire (1966), 185
History of the County of Warwick (Victoria County History), Volume 7: City of Birmingham (1964), 387
'Welcome to the Parish of St Faith and St Laurence', unpublished church guide (2008)

HISTORY: The current parish of St Faith and St Laurence was created out of parts of the parishes of St Peter, Harborne and Christ Church Quinton. The suburb of Harborne expanded rapidly in the years around the turn of the C20, and mission churches were set up to serve the burgeoning congregations by both parishes in the area: Christ Church Quinton established their mission church of St Lawrence in 1901, and neighbouring St Peter, Harborne, set up a church to St Faith in 1904. The mission church of St Faith was a timber and iron building erected temporarily on land donated by the major local landowner, Lord Calthorpe. A permanent site for the church of St Faith was donated in 1909, and the mission church moved to the site - that of the present church. Over the ensuing years, parishioners raised funds for a replacement church building, including some donations from Harborne War Memorial. In 1933, it was agreed to extend the proposed parish to include the portion of Christ Church parish which was being served by the mission church of St Lawrence. The combined parish of St Faith and St Laurence (the spelling changed from the earlier church) was established in 1937, and the first vicar appointed on 2 October 1937.

The present church was designed by Philip Boughton Chatwin (1873-1964) in 1936 and built as far as the chancel arch in 1937. The building, then comprising nave, aisles and tower, was consecrated in 1937, and building of the remainder was postponed by the intervention of World War II. Work did not resume until 1958, when Chatwin, together with his nephew Anthony, revised the earlier plans slightly and added the chancel, Lady Chapel and vestries; the church was dedicated in a service by the Bishop in March 1960. A new church hall was added to the site in the later C20, a single-storey addition in matching materials, adjacent to the church but largely detached from it.

REASONS FOR DESIGNATION:
The church of St Faith and St Laurence is designated at Grade II, for the following principal reasons:
* The church is an elegant design of 1936-7 by P B Chatwin, a significant regional architect, and is largely intact and unaltered
* The building has a pared-down exterior in a Romanesque style which is robust yet displays a light touch
* Its interior is particularly successful, broad and high with a sense of loftiness, and sophistication in its structure and detailing
* Though the chancel and vestries were not added until 1958-60, they were to Chatwin's original design and the work was overseen by him and his nephew, Anthony Chatwin
* It retains an extensive scheme of good-quality stained glass throughout the building, much by Hardman and Co, as well as other high-quality furnishings
* The church serves as a war memorial to the men of Harborne who fell in the First World War

This List entry has been amended to add sources for War Memorials Online and the War Memorials Register. These sources were not used in the compilation of this List entry but are added here as a guide for further reading, 21 August 2017.

Reasons for Listing

The church of St Faith and St Laurence is designated at Grade II, for the following principal reasons:
* The church is an elegant design of 1936-7 by P B Chatwin, a significant regional architect, and is largely intact and unaltered
* The building has a pared-down exterior in an Arts and Crafts-influenced Romanesque style which is robust yet displays a light touch
* Its interior is particularly successful, broad and high with a sense of loftiness, and sophistication in its structure and detailing
* Though the east end was not added until 1958-60, the additions were to Chatwin's design and the work was overseen by him and his nephew, Anthony Chatwin
* It retains an extensive scheme of good-quality stained glass throughout the building, much by Hardman and Co, as well as other high-quality furnishings
* The church serves as a war memorial to the men of Harborne who fell in the First World War
* The attached church centre, added in the later C20, although designed to complement the existing church buildings, is not of special interest

External Links

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