Shrine of Our Lady of Mount Carmel and St Simon Stock, Aylesford, Kent

Summary

Roman Catholic shrine and chapels, 1958-65 by Adrian Gilbert Scott, with artworks and furnishings by Adam Kossowski, Michael Clark, Dom Charles Norris and others.

Description

Roman Catholic shrine and chapels, 1958-65 by Adrian Gilbert Scott, with artworks and furnishings by Adam Kossowski, Michael Clark, Dom Charles Norris and others.

MATERIALS: concrete walls faced in reclaimed Kentish ragstone rubble, with arches, window mullions, sills and surrounds, door surrounds, buttresses and parapet copings of pre-cast concrete. Clay tile roofs with areas of flat roof finished in asphalt, in places overlaid with felt. Rain water goods are of cast iron.

PLAN: the building consists of four principal octagonal spaces, each connected by lower link buildings, or tribunes. The elongated central octagon contains the Main Shrine, which is open to the west, addressing a large, T-shaped, sunken piazza. Tribunes lead to the Relic Chapel to the north-east, Choir Chapel to the south-west, and Chapel of St Joseph to the north-west. The tribune to the Relic Chapel is enclosed, while the other two are open to the piazza. A belfry tower and the small Chapel of St Anne both give off the Main Shrine, and further small chapels and ancillary spaces give off the other main chapels

EXTERIOR: the architectural style is a stripped, modern, Gothic. The Main Shrine, Chapel of St Joseph and Choir Chapel, and their linking tribunes, form the backdrop to the piazza. The Main Shrine has a wide two-centred arch, with lower, four-centred arches giving onto the tribunes and Chapel of St Anne. Above the main arch is a Jerusalem Cross. Alongside the entrance to the Chapel of St Anne, a foundation stone is set into the wall.

Viewed from the piazza, the external design of the two outer chapels is identical, with windows generally of a simple lancet type and blind concrete trefoil panels over the entrances. Above each of the entrances are the painted arms and motto of Bishop Cowderoy of Southwark (Chapel of St Joseph) and the Carmelite order (Choir Chapel). The walls have raised parapets. The open-fronted tribunes from the Main Shrine to the Chapel of St Joseph and the Choir Chapel are arcaded and have plain canted plaster ceilings. They retain their original simple oak seating and metal light fittings, and have a gated entrance into their respective chapels. The rear elevations are plain in character, with concrete trefoil-headed window openings set into the chapel walls and ancillary spaces, some of which are canted.

PIAZZA: designed to accommodate up to 2000 pilgrims on wooden benches, this is paved with grey concrete flagstones, with lighter coloured flagstones used to mark out the site of the medieval foundations. The site of the De Grey family vault (original thirteenth century donors of the site to the Carmelites) is marked by a small white stone cross set into a flagstone before the steps which lead up to the Main Shrine. There is little intrinsic interest in the paving itself, the significance comes in its subtle expression of the site's continuity as a place of worship. Spatially, the size of the piazza and its relationship with the shrine and chapels give the ensemble a sense of scale and consequence. The original bench seating is not fixed and therefore does not form part of the listed building.

INTERIOR: the interiors are generally architecturally plain, with plastered walls, flat ceilings canted at the sides. They provide a self-effacing backdrop for the furnishings, which unless stated otherwise are by Adam Kossowski.

The MAIN SHRINE altar, crucifix and ceramic candlesticks date from 1959. The stone altar is faced in blue-green ceramic tiles and incorporates twelve yellow-glazed ceramic symbols. Behind the altar is a reredos panel with sgraffito decoration on the theme of the symbolic names of the Virgin Mary from the Litany of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Above this the apse is lined with glazed bright blue-green ceramic mosaics incorporating yellow daggers representing tears, to be read as emanating from the statue of the Virgin of the Glorious Assumption, by Michael Clark, nine feet high, carved from West African Agba wood and thumb gilded in gold leaf. Set high in the deep red-painted flanking walls are large ceramic hosts of angels in ochre shades. The whole is a striking composition of colour, pattern and form.

Metal gates made by John Emery from designs by Kossowski lead to the small Chapel of St Anne (dedicated in memory of Anne Marie Cowderoy, mother of the seventh Bishop of Southwark). This is a complete Kossowski interior; the walls are lined with sgraffito decoration incorporating glazed ceramic figures. The green and dark green sgraffito on the side walls provides a continuous semi-abstract landscape backdrop to ceramic reliefs in yellow, blue and purple glazes. These depict scenes from the life of St Anne. The (ritual) East window is blind and is the setting for a late C15 statue of St Anne, attributed to Tilman Riemenschneider. The splays of the east window are inset with abstract ceramic elements. The altar front is decorated with the monogram of Christ between the letters A (Anne) and M (Mary), and placed on the altar are a ceramic crucifix incorporating the figures of St John the Evangelist and St Mary (signed AD 1962) and two candlesticks. The windows have pale blue and green semi-abstract glass incorporating monograms, and the floor is of ceramic tiles in green, grey-blue and black, incorporating the motif of a tree.

Metal gates by Emery and Kossowski lead to the enclosed tribune to the Relic Chapel. A room housing confessionals gives off to the left. The tribune has a plain ceramic tile floor and original light fittings. Here, as elsewhere (where stained glass or dalle de verre are not employed), the windows have diamond quarries, half antique glass in three shades of green and half plain, as specified by Scott. Mounted on the wall on the left hand side are small oak kneeling figures of St Teresa of Avila and St Thérèse of Lisieux, by Philip Lindsey Clark. The seating consists of individual wooden chairs.

The RELIC CHAPEL has a tiled dais, its forward altar of 1963 with a dark grey granite mensa and a brick and concrete base inlaid with ceramic relief decoration in red glaze on black. Flanking the altar are two lecterns, also red glaze on a black background, with ceramic reliefs of the four Evangelists. Around the walls are ceramic reliefs of the Stations of the Cross, 1963-6. The chapel corners contain four pairs of semi-abstract dalle de verre windows made by Dom Charles Norris from Kossowski’s designs. The windows in the exedra chapels also contain delle de verre glass by Norris. The pendant iron light fittings are by John Emery, the seating consists mainly of simple open-backed benches.

The Reliquary of St Simon Stock is located in an exedra beyond the altar. This extraordinary and impressive piece is 11 ft (3.3m) high, clad with ceramic tiles on a concrete body. The white and gold glazed tiles represent Mount Carmel with its hermits’ houses, and kneeling angels guard the central grille made by John Emery which contains the relic. Behind this, on a stone shelf and plinth against the wall, is an oak statue of St Simon Stock by Philip Lindsey Clark.

A sacristy wraps around the exedra of the Relic Chapel. The dalle de verre windows are protected internally by ironwork, the former communion rails to the Choir Chapel.

The Chapel of Carmelite Saints lies in the south-east exedra of the Relic Chapel; it was fitted out by Kossowski in 1964-5. The altar incorporates a ceramic representation of the entrance to the Holy Sepulchre, and on it stands an oak crucifix with ceramic base and corpus. Behind, ceramic relief plaques depict Carmelite saints. The panels flank a central wooden carving of the Scapular Vision (medieval, of unknown provenance, acquired in 1951). Below is a horizontal ceramic plaque representing the landscape of Mount Carmel.

The Chapel of the English and Welsh Martyrs (Blessed Sacrament Chapel) lies in the north-west exedra of the Relic Chapel. It has inset ceramic panels, fitted out by Kossowski in 1965-7. The reliefs are of red glaze (for martyrdom) on a blueish-black clay background. The altar front depicts the martyrdom of St Thomas Becket at Canterbury. Behind the altar are reliefs of St Thomas More and St John Fisher (1965). Reliefs on the side walls date from 1967 and include the names of martyrs and related imagery and symbolism.

The CHAPEL OF ST JOSEPH stands to the north-west of the Main Shrine; it was built in 1966 but fitting out (involving reorientation) was not completed until 1971. It is the most richly decorated of the three main chapels, its plastered walls all inset with ceramic relief panels, and the main altar being a set-piece of Kossowski's work. The seating consists of plain open-backed oak benches, facing towards the altar and Statue of St Joseph. The pendant iron light fittings are by John Emery. There is no stained or dalle de verre glass, only tinted glass as specified by Scott. The original Scott altar is placed in an exedra on the north-east side, and is a large monolith of Hornton stone. Behind it is a ceramic crucifix with figures of St Mary and St John. What is now the main altar (since 1971) is placed in front of the exedra on the north-west side. This has a marble mensa on ceramic-clad supports. The altar is raised on a dais floored with ceramic sgraffito on green tiles with inscriptions and symbols of the four evangelists. Behind the altar exedra stands a giant, solid oak carving of St Joseph, by Michael Clark (c1963). The walls are lined with sgraffito decoration on green tiles representing the idea of the Universal Church, with the Basilica of St Peter, Rome, at the centre.

The four walls of the chapel incorporate large ceramic reliefs as follows:
-- over the main altar: the Nativity; to the left, the Dream of Joseph and the Marriage of Joseph and Mary; to the right, the Flight into Egypt and the Finding in the Temple;
-- on the north-east wall, over the original altar: Transfiguration, with Moses and Elijah; to the left St John the Baptist; to the right St John the Evangelist;
-- on the south-east wall, over the entrance from the tribune: Elisha called from a plough to follow Elijah; to the left, Sacrifice of Elijah; to the right, Chariot of Fire carrying Elijah to Heaven;
-- on the south-west wall, over the entrance from the piazza: Adoration of the Cross by two angels; to the left: inscription from the Book of Psalms (Ps. 90, 2); to the right: inscription from St Paul’s Second Letter to the Corinthians.

The CHOIR CHAPEL is the plainest of all the interiors, with little by way of sculptural or ceramic enrichment. The forward altar is of table form, of white marble; it dates from 1968 and was probably designed by Anthony Gilbert Scott. It is raised on a wooden platform, with an oak lectern and choir seating to either side. The main floor is tiled (geometrical pattern of cream and crown, the Carmelite colours), the lighting is in the form of hanging iron pendants by John Emery, and the seating is of simple open-backed benches. Artworks include a crucifix by Kossowski over the exedra arch and a wooden carving of the Madonna and Child to its right by Philip Lindsey Clark. An extension of the south cloister leads to the main sacristy, a single-storey flat-roofed building added to the side of the medieval structure. This has a woodblock floor and retains its original fitted cupboards, made on site.

History

Aylesford Priory (The Friars) was originally established in 1242 as the first house of the Carmelites in England. It was also held to be the site of St Simon Stock’s mystical vision of the scapular. On 16 July 1251 it is believed that the Virgin Mary appeared to Simon Stock, a Carmelite Prior, and gave him the brown scapular, part of the Carmelite habit, with the promise that those who die wearing it shall attain salvation.

The medieval church was dismantled after Dissolution in 1538, but the remaining friary buildings were retained and adapted for secular use. The site was reacquired by the Carmelites in 1949, the driving force behind this reacquisition being the Prior, Fr Malachy Lynch. Although habitable, the buildings were in need of considerable repair, and despite post-war building restrictions, this work was largely complete by 1954, under the direction of Hugh Braun, the architectural writer and historian.

The creation of a new shrine at Aylesford was always central to Fr Malachy’s vision for the development of the priory. In 1951, a relic of the skull of St Simon Stock was brought to Aylesford by the Bishop of Bordeaux (where the saint was buried). In the same year, an archaeological investigation uncovered the foundations of the medieval Church of the Assumption of the Glorious Virgin, and a temporary altar and canopy designed by Philip Lindsey Clark were set up over the site identified as that of the original high altar. The initial intention was that The Friars should be a place of study, but it soon became a place of pilgrimage, with ceremonies attracting over 20,000 visitors.

According to Fr Malachy’s account, Adrian Gilbert Scott came to survey the site on Ascension Day, 1954 ‘for plans for the rebuilding of the church’. The precise circumstances of the architect’s introduction to the project are not clear, but it is probably no coincidence that in the same year his older brother, Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, was appointed to rebuild the Carmelite church of Our Lady of Mount Carmel and St Simon Stock, Kensington. However, at Aylesford the rebuilding did not take the form of a church of traditional plan, but rather a series of linked chapels enclosing an open-air sunken piazza. The building blends comfortably with its historic site, yet its planning is highly innovative. There was a resurgence of interest in the act of pilgrimage in Britain in the C19 and C20, and out-door worship had become a feature of this, due to a lack of medieval churches available to Catholics. At Aylesford, with its history of loss, ruination and recovery, this was consciously maintained, creating a nave without walls or roof. The building's openness, its permeability between inside and outside space, gives it a timeless quality, evocative of an ancient site of gathering or collective experience. On a practical level, it could accommodate large numbers of congregants when necessary, whilst offering smaller, enclosed, spaces for prayer and worship at other times.

It is likely that Scott did not charge for his labours. There was no budget and no grants or major donations available, but a large number of small donations came in from all over the world; ‘Our Lady’s Building Company’, established by the resourceful Fr Malachy, had 25,000 members and supporters. Scott was assisted by his son Anthony Gilbert Scott, while Percy Kitchen, an expert in laying Kentish ragstone, was foreman in overall charge. The engineer who advised on the foundations offered his services gratis, and volunteer builders, skilled and unskilled came from England, Belgium, Italy and elsewhere. Able-bodied friars were also enlisted to help.

After uncovering the remaining foundations of the medieval church, twenty foot piles were driven through the mud to reach the bedrock for the foundations of the new shrine. The foundation stone was laid on 20 July 1958, the Solemnity of the Feast of Carmel. By September 1960 work was sufficiently advanced for the installation of the nine-foot high wooden statue of Our Lady of the Assumption, commissioned from Michael Clark. The Main Shrine, chapels and sacristies were completed by 1961 and the Relic Chapel in 1963 (the year of Adrian Gilbert Scott’s death at the age of 81). In 1964 the relic of St Simon Stock was transferred from the Cloister Chapel to a new Reliquary in the Relic Chapel, designed and made by Adam Kossowski. Altars were reconsecrated on 18 July 1965 by Cyril Cowderoy, Archbishop of Southwark, in the presence of Cardinal Heenan.

The plans for the shrine chapels were originally conceived before the liturgical reforms of the Second Vatican Council (1962-5), the full implementation of which Scott did not live to see. However, the younger Adam Kossowski (born in 1905) later recalled a visit in 1962 to the church of St Germain des Prés in Paris, where he saw ‘for the first time the new liturgy in operation with a free-standing altar and a lectern on each side. I was very much taken by this transformation of the old church and by the magnificent spirit of participation by the congregation’. This was the inspiration for the layout of the Relic Chapel, and shows the influence that Kossowski brought to bear not just on the artistic furnishings but also on the liturgical arrangements. The only substantial changes made to the liturgical layout have been in the Choir Chapel, where the altar rails were removed and a forward altar introduced in 1968 (probably by Anthony Gilbert Scott) and the re-orientating of St Joseph’s Chapel so that the Kossowski altar in front of the Clark statue of St Joseph is now the main focus, while the original Scott altar remains in situ.

Adrian Gilbert Scott (1882-1963) was part of a remarkable dynasty of English church architects descended from Sir George Gilbert Scott (1811-1878). He trained with his brother Giles, architect of the Anglican cathedral in Liverpool, on which he worked. Adrian Scott was a devout Catholic and most of the buildings he designed were churches, the majority being Roman Catholic, although his oeuvre included Anglican buildings, such as the cathedral in Cairo. His style was an idiosyncratic blend of modern and gothic, employing massive forms in broadly traditional ecclesiastical compositions.

As important as the architecture of the shrine, is the rich and beautifully construed decorative work, including ceramics, murals and sgraffito, by Adam Kossowski. Kossowki (1905–1986) was a Polish emigré who worked at Aylesford from 1950 until 1971, eventually completing some one hundred works, and finally being laid to rest in the grounds. He studied art and architecture in Poland in the 1920s, but was arrested by invading Russians in 1939 and imprisoned in Soviet labour camps. He reached England in 1942 and, in 1950, he was introduced to Fr Malachy Lynch by Phillip Lindsey Clark and commissioned to produce a series murals for the (then) Chapter Room (now the Prior's Hall) at The Friars. This commission was followed by numerous others, most notably for the interiors of the new shrine.

Reasons for Listing

The Roman Catholic Shrine of Our Lady of Mount Carmel and St Simon Stock, Aylesford, 1958-65, by Adrian Gilbert Scott, is listed at Grade II* for the following principal reasons:

* Historic and religious interest: as an especially notable example in England of an ancient monastic site being ‘reclaimed’ as a place of modern pilgrimage;
* Architectural interest: its quiet contextualism, combined with a highly ingenious plan-form and open-air worship space, distinguish it as a particularly unusual example of post-war religious architecture, by a Roman Catholic architect of note;
* Artistic interest: as well as artworks from several renowned Catholic artists, the building is enriched by a broad and impressive scheme of artworks and liturgical furnishings by Adam Kossowski;
* Craftsmanship: as a series of complete, bespoke, interiors, featuring metalwork, joinery and glass, designed primarily by Scott and Kossowski, and made by local craftsmen;
* Group value: as a creative and successful intervention in the fabric and setting of an ancient site, the building has strong group value with the restored monastery buildings, listed at Grade I.

External Links

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