BLOOMSBURY CENTRAL BAPTIST CHURCH

BLOOMSBURY CENTRAL BAPTIST CHURCH, 235, SHAFTESBURY AVENUE

Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places

Overview

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1271628
Date first listed:: 04-Nov-1994
List Entry Name:: BLOOMSBURY CENTRAL BAPTIST CHURCH
Statutory Address:: BLOOMSBURY CENTRAL BAPTIST CHURCH, 235, SHAFTESBURY AVENUE

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Date:: 2007-04-19
Reference:: IOE01/16138/09
Rights:: © Dr Barbara Hilton. Source: Historic England Archive

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1271628
Date first listed:: 04-Nov-1994
List Entry Name:: BLOOMSBURY CENTRAL BAPTIST CHURCH
Statutory Address 1:: BLOOMSBURY CENTRAL BAPTIST CHURCH, 235, SHAFTESBURY AVENUE

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

Location

Statutory Address:: BLOOMSBURY CENTRAL BAPTIST CHURCH, 235, SHAFTESBURY AVENUE

The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.

County:: Greater London Authority
District:: Camden (London Borough)
Parish:: Non Civil Parish
National Grid Reference:: TQ 30068 81390

Details

CAMDEN

TQ3081SW SHAFTESBURY AVENUE 798-1/105/1428 (East side) 04/11/94 No.235 Bloomsbury Central Baptist Church (Formerly Listed as: SHAFTESBURY AVENUE Central Baptist Church)

GV II

Baptist church. c1845-8. By John Gibson. For Sir Samuel Morton Peto on speculation because he considered a church was needed in the area. Grey brick with stone dressings and vertical bands. Early Italian Gothic style. Rectangular plan. EXTERIOR: 2 storeys and attics. West front of 3 windows flanked by rectangular towers. 3 central moulded arch entrances above which a Lombardic frieze and large rose window flanked by 2 round-arched windows. Deep Lombardic frieze beneath arcaded attic windows crowned by a balustrade. 4-stage towers with vertical bands and small windows; 4th stages are belfries with round-arched openings, friezes and cornices having trefoil enriched dies at angles; formerly with short spires, removed due to war damage. INTERIOR: horseshoe-shaped auditorium with curved gallery supported on polygonal cast-iron columns; the gallery with arcaded-patterned front. Decorated square columns rise from gallery to roof. Good curved pews, and stained glass incorporating texts. Balcony reached by winding wrought-iron stairs in angles either side of narrow central entrance foyer refitted c1960s. HISTORICAL NOTE: this was the first Baptist chapel to stand prominently on a London street, looking like a "church", reflecting the improved status of Victorian dissenters. Legend records that when Peto sought to lease the land, the First Commissioner of Woods & Forests told him that Nonconformist chapels were too dull: he liked a church with a spire. "A spire?" exclaimed Peto, "My Lord, we shall have two!".

Listing NGR: TQ3007881386

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:: 477974
Legacy System:: LBS

Legal

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