Description

James McLachlan, 1926-1929. Small Art Deco-Romanesque church with gabled side aisles, slender campanile and pavilions, halls and offices behind chancel to E. Cream sandstone, bull-faced coursed and squared rubble with polished ashlar detailing. Round-arched openings with pronounced rubble voussoirs; principal windows with square chamfered reveals in ashlar panels; ashlar mullions; lugged gables with shaped apexes.

W ELEVATION: gabled nave with off-set clasping buttresses (as angle pilasters) rising above wallhead in stylised Art Deco coping with motif of 4 squares in ashlar panel; tall tripartite window in round-arched panel to gable with carved pelican flanked by A and O symbols at head; arrowslit window in gablehead. Recessed single-bay side aisles with stepped parapet and lancet windows. 2 small square-plan arched entrance pavilions with swept pyramidal roofs flanking, connected to W gable by vestibule wall of 2 windows, arched openings with sliding and folding cast-iron lattice gates. Pavilions linked by low rubble wall with ashlar diamond balusters and ashlar coping.

S ELEVATION: 3-bay gabled side aisle to centre with clasping buttresses and tall bipartite windows in round-arched panels with carved roundels to each gable, small arrowslit windows in gableheads. Tall slender square-section campanile with small doorway in re-entrant angle to left, top stage with bipartite openings to each face with ashlar mullions and cushion capitals, finialled bellcast roof. Flat-roofed vestibule to left with 2 paired windows and single window forming link with entrance pavilion.To right flat-roofed link of 3 paired windows and depressed-arched doorway to halls and offices; 3 tall paired chancel windows to main block above, mullioned and transomed oculus to main block above doorway. Gabled hall to outer right with rectangular bipartite window in round-arched ashlar panel, arrowslit window in gablehead. N ELEVATION: detailed as S elevation minus campanile with 2-storey separate offices adjoining to E and additional single window to vestibule passage to W.

E ELEVATION: 4 gabled centre bays with rectangular single windows to ground and 1st floor, 2 round-arched windows in gablehead. Hall to left with rectangular bipartite window in ashlar panel. 2-storey offices adjoining to right with secondary door and rectangular single windows. Square leaded panes to church, timber sash and case windows with 6-pane upper sashes and 9-pane lower sashes to offices. Red interlocking tiles; ashlar coped skews.

INTERIOR: plain interior with white-washed barrel vault to nave and barrel vaults at right angles to each aisle bay, rising from moulded ashlar corbels and piers of banded ashlar with rounded arrises and moulded capitals. Plain timber pews, choir stalls and pulpit. Organ in E wall (Cousans & Sons, 1904; rebuilt 1955). Distinctive hanging lights to arcade arches.

Stained glass: memorial to WWI in centre window of S aisle by Ballantine; memorial to WWII in left window of S aisle by William Wilson.

Statement of Interest

Ecclesiastical building in use as such. Originally Morningside Congregational Church, this church became the first case of a union between a Congregational Church and the Church of Scotland, forming Morningside United in 1979. The hall complex with six class rooms and the church officer's house was completed and opened in 1926, the foundation stone of the church was laid in 1928 and the opening service held in 1929. The overall cost was $24,000.

External Links

• Historic Environment Scotland Listing
• Wikidata Q17811584

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.

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