Church of the Holy Trinity

Details

795/24/105 MANOR ROAD 01-MAR-74 (Northeast side) CHURCH OF THE HOLY TRINITY

II 1866-7 by E Habershon and E P Loftus Brock. 2002, parish centre.

MATERIALS: Flint-faced with Bath stone dressings. Limestone spire. Tiled roofs with that on the chancel having polychrome diapering.

PLAN: W steeple, nave, N and S aisles, S porch, short chancel with a three-sided apse, N vestry/organ chamber, N parish centre

EXTERIOR: The W steeple is a local landmark and faces the main road. The tower is of three stages and has angle buttresses on its W face. There is a W doorway with a two-light window above. In the belfry stage the openings have two-lights with a small quatrefoil in the head. Immediately below the spire is a quatrefoil frieze. The spire has extremely small, low broaches and one tier of small lucarnes half-way up. The aisles are placed under their own gables, have buttresses with offsets to demarcate the bays, and have elaborate flowing tracery in early C14 style in the various three- and four-light windows. There is no clerestory. The flowing tracery is continued into the two-light windows of the chancel whose roof ridge is rather lower than that of the nave. The S porch is of timber, now painted bright blue. The C19 vestry block on the N has now been dwarfed by a large modern parish centre which is as long as the church itself and extends a considerable distance to the N

INTERIOR: The character of the interior is broad and low thanks to the substantial width of the nave, quite low arcades with short piers, spreading chancel arch, and the lack of a clerestory. The walls are plastered and whitened. The nave is of four bays and has an arcade with round piers with foliage capitals. Its arches have one sunk quadrant moulding and round the outer edge an order of red tiles set flush with the walling. The chancel arch takes up virtually the whole of the E end of the nave. The chancel is remarkably short. Over the nave there is an arch-braced roof with crown-posts to the collar. This roof is reinforced with iron ties. The chancel roof is also arch-braced while the ones to the aisles have tie-beams and scissor-braces. The nave, aisle and choir floors are of red and black quarry tiles. Entrances to the parish centre have been formed cutting doorways beneath the tracery of the two NW windows in the N aisle.

PRINCIPAL FIXTURES: The alabaster font is a fine piece, with a circular, chalice-shaped bowl set on eight detached grey-green marble shafts and alabaster central pillar, and is said to date from about the mid-1920s. The pews are to a large extent complete and have shaped ends which still retain the pew numbers. The communion rails, stalls and pulpit date from the mid-1920s and were designed by Gerald Cogswell and carved by E Marus. There is an extensive collection of stained glass throughout the church windows.

SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: The parsonage to the NE of the church was contracted for in July 1867 and is also by Habershon and Brock and was complete by December 1870.

HISTORY: Development of the area began in earnest after the opening of the railway in 1847 and land enclosure in 1853. The prime mover was Nathaniel Bridges, the lord of the manor, who probably appointed E P Loftus Brock as surveyor for the development of his land. A key element in this was the provision of a church which Bridges paid for as a memorial to his father who had died in June 1865. The breadth of the nave, the shortness of the chancel and general lack of High Church Victorian fittings suggests the leanings of a Low Church client. The builder was Samuel Simpson of Tottenham Court Road and the contract was let at a cost of £3,955 the church was built in 1866-7. Simpson also built the parsonage. The main design of the church is believed to be the work of Brock. Architects: Edward Habershon (d 1901) was in partnership with his brother William Gilbee Habershon (1818 or 19-91) until 1863. E P Loftus Brock (1833-95) was in the office of W G Habershon and Edward Habershon from 1851. He was the managing clerk to Edward and, from 1865, a partner. He succeeded him on his retirement in 1879.

SOURCES: Bridget Cherry and Nikolaus Pevsner, The Buildings of England: London 2: South, 1983, p 640. www.sutton.gov.uk/index.aspx?/articleid=1272 (viewed at April 2009)

REASONS FOR DESIGNATION: Holy Trinity church is designated at Grade II for the following principal reasons: * It is a mid-Victorian Gothic Revival church built in the early C14 style with an imposing NW steeple. * It has fittings of the both the C19 and C20, of which the font is particularly notable

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

206754

Legacy System:

LBS

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