PARISH CHURCH OF ST LUKE

Overview

Location

Details

TORQUAY

SX9163 ST LUKE'S ROAD 885-1/17/231 (West side) 14/02/72 Parish Church of St Luke (Formerly Listed as: ST LUKE'S ROAD Church of St Luke)

GV II*

Parish church. 1863, to the designs of A Blomfield; restoration after fire damage in 1964. Local grey uncoursed limestone rubble; freestone dressings, some banded with limestone; slate roofs. Geometric Decorated style. PLAN: Nave; chancel with polygonal apse; 5-bay north and south aisles; north-west tower incorporating porch; west end narthex; east end church hall at right-angles to nave and linked to main body of church. EXTERIOR: Robust and unconventional, particularly the west end. 2-light west window to nave with traceried roundel above and common hoodmould. West end narthex above battered basement level has 2-light windows piercing an arcade on columns with carved capitals. Narthex entered via steps and porch on south side or via tower on north side. 3-stage tower with octagonal belfry stage and stone spire with lucarnes. North side of tower has steps up to open arcaded 4-sided porch with pyramidal slate roof, the arcade with cylindrical columns and carved capitals; paired plank doors. North and south aisles with 5 gabled bays, the north aisle (show front) with buttresses supporting detached columns with carved capitals and carved symbols of the evangelists. North-east gabled porch with moulded 2-centred arched doorway with a carved niche in the gable. Polygonal east end with tall one-light windows with traceried heads. A link block containing a trefoil-headed doorway at the north-east gives access to the gable-ended hall which has a stack with stone shaft at the south end and a ribbon of 6 stone mullioned windows below a sexafoil roundel with common voussoirs. INTERIOR: Good example of late C19 enriched interior, very complete although some of the painted decoration was restored after the 1964 fire. Moulded chancel arch on short columns with carved angel corbels and stiff-leaf capitals. 5-bay arcade with unusual short cast-iron columns on deep plinths. The columns have bead-moulded capitals and double-chamfered arches. 6-bay ceiled, keeled wagon roof to nave with moulded ribs springing from corbels. Aisle roofed in bays, each a keeled, ceiled wagon with chamfered ribs. Keeled ceiled wagon roof to chancel with moulded ribs forming panels, all lavishly painted in 1870 by Heaton Butler and Bayne (Pevsner). Chancel and sanctuary walls entirely covered with stencil and freehand paintings with remains of (repaired) sgraffito with mosaic roundels. Gabled stone reredos with carved scene in deep relief of the Last Supper. Good floor tiling; sedilia; brass and wrought upper sanctuary rail; local marble chancel screen with blind white Italian marble arcading with brass rails and gates. Alabaster and local marble drum pulpit with pierced traceried openings. The nave fittings include a good High Victorian font on raised marble paving. Square font with corner shafts, the stone inlaid with marble with carved symbols in roundels. West end gallery on slender iron columns with a stout timber front with diagonal bracing. STAINED GLASS includes a fine Heaton Butler and Bayne west window. Sanctuary windows said to be by same firm (Pevsner). Small window by Kempe firm in the narthex. (Brooks C: Devon Nineteenth Century Churches Project Archive: 48 Park St. Crediton; Buildings of England: Pevsner N: Devon: London: 1952-1989: P.849).

Listing NGR: SX9130363948

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

390783

Legacy System:

LBS

Sources

Books and journals
Brooks, C, Cherry, M, Cox, J , Devon Nineteenth Century Churches Project Archive
Pevsner, N, The Buildings of England: South Devon, (1952), 849
Pevsner, N, Cherry, B, The Buildings of England: Devon, (1989), 849

Legal

This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.