Church of St Peter

Details

SX9372
25-1/6/39

SHALDON
BRIDGE ROAD, (east side)
Church of St Peter

30/06/49

GV
I

Parish church. 1893-1902 by Edmund Sedding. Flying buttresses added 1932 by W.D Caröe.

MATERIALS: mostly red sandstone with Cornish polyphant quoins, strings of Portland stone and polyphant to the clerestorey; Ham Hill stone flying buttresses; all these and various marbles to the interior; slate roof.

STYLE: Arts and Crafts Free Gothic.

PLAN: six bay truncated cruciform plan with semi-octagonal apsed chancel, north transept and low gabled vestry with cupola, south east apsed chapel.

EXTERIOR: castellated parapet to the nave; arcaded clerestorey of alternate trefoil-headed leaded windows and niches; moulded coping to the parapet of the buttressed aisles, six 1932 flying buttresses. The west front has a low flat-roofed baptistery between two lobbies: these have pointed-arched doors to front and returns below flying buttresses filled in with panelled tracery; three lancet windows to the centre. The west window spanning the whole interior of the nave is set in a deeply recessed Gothic arch, it has two wide mullions and exuberant flowing cusped tracery. Rising from the front of the baptistery are two wide shafts banded red and white reaching to the parapet of the nave. A high pointed arch connecting them has a banded gable end above, with a gabled niche to the apex containing a statue of St Peter.

INTERIOR: spectacular. Stained-glass windows by Sedding to the nave, chancel and Lady Chapel. Plymouth stone widely-chamfered rectangular-section piers with slightly concave facets support Portland stone pointed arches with alternate blocked voussoirs. Plymouth stone niches to the spandrels have large granite blocks to the tops which support substantial white marble transverse arches with wrought-iron ties and ornamental verticals which articulate the panelled marble and Plymouth stone barrel vault. Widely-splayed pointed arches to trefoil-headed clerestorey windows.

The roofs of the aisles are planked with crown-post trusses; red sandstone walls; alternate two- and three-light mullioned windows with cusped drop tracery to the arches. The semi-octagonal chancel, of two and a half bays, is similar to the nave and far more ornamented. The walls of the apse are banded grey and white; the panels of the roof are smaller and diminish around the apse with the principal ribs resting on niches with statues and elaborate corbels flanked by windows. The block voussoirs to the arches are richly carved, the floor is of diagonally-laid black and white marble squares, with black, white and red marble steps to the altar.

The elaborate polyphant and marble rood screen has a pierced parapet behind 5 statues on a solid cornice with a crucifix above the central figure. An inscription, "Dignus est Angus qui occisus est accipere virtutem", is carved into the cornice over five arches which are pointed to the sides with wrought-iron infill and semicircular to the centre, all with drop tracery. Curved white marble steps lead to double fretted metal gates flanked by a polished green marble plinth with polished moulded marble coping. Carved marble communion rail.

The Lady Chapel, similar but smaller in scale, is lit entirely by richly-coloured trefoil-headed lancet windows. Panels of the roof are smaller, a two bay arcade to the south has cylindrical capitals to columns with four colonnettes; the altar has a carved white marble communion rail and an ornamental marble floor. The vestry has a planked ceiling and red sandstone walls.

FITTINGS: include a grand pulpit on a black marble octagonal stepped base to a shaft surrounded by red marble colonnettes with grey caps and bases. These support a pedestal to the body of the pulpit which has green marble panels with trefoil-headed openings and dark brown marble moulded base and cornice. Shafts at the angles are of very elaborately-carved white marble. The curved figured marble steps, arched below, have a wrought-iron balustrade. The coloured marble altar has a triple arcade, plinth and cornice. The organ to the left of the chancel, rebuilt in 1985, has an ornamented case. The font is a white marble figure of St John the Baptist bearing a clam-shell. The stations of the cross are of carved wood.

HISTORICAL NOTE: a tower was to have been erected on the north river side. Edmund Sedding was responsible for many church restorations in the south west and was nephew to J.D Sedding, architect of Holy Trinity, Sloane Square, London. Pevsner describes the church as a superlative example of Arts and Crafts inventiveness. The original cost, including fitting, heating and lighting was £2,500.

Listing NGR: SX9315272451

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

460984

Legacy System:

LBS

Sources

Books and journals
Pevsner, N, Cherry, B, The Buildings of England: Devon, (1989), 797

End of official list entry

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