Church of St Catherine

Church of St Catherine, Aylesham Road

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

Overview

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II*
List Entry Number:: 1391746
Date first listed:: 21-Aug-2006
List Entry Name:: Church of St Catherine
Statutory Address:: Church of St Catherine, Aylesham Road

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II*
List Entry Number:: 1391746
Date first listed:: 21-Aug-2006
List Entry Name:: Church of St Catherine
Statutory Address 1:: Church of St Catherine, Aylesham Road

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:: Church of St Catherine, Aylesham Road

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

County:: Norfolk
District:: Norwich (District Authority)
Parish:: Non Civil Parish
National Grid Reference:: TG 21951 10923

Details

1188/0/10132 AYLSHAM ROAD Church of St Catherine

21-AUG-06

GV II* Church. 1933-35. By A.D.R Caröe and A.P Robinson. Grey-purple and buff-brown brick with blue-grey pantile roof with blank parapets. Plan of chancel, low crossing tower, transepts, and nave with north and south vestries and porches.

A subtle combination of elemental Romanesque and modern styles with tall narrow square-headed windows. Chancel has a broken-pointed east window and a tall window to each side, then there is a saddleback-roofed tower oversailing the projecting transepts. These again have tall windows and the tower has narrow louvred openings, those to east and west a group of five following the line of the gable. The nave has five tall windows to each side set in panels framed by thin buttresses and a projecting blank parapet. Small vestry and porch projections with carefully designed shallow planes of brickwork and ornamental doors. The west end has a monumental arch between two tower elements with a seven-light window within, following the arch and set over the bowed projection of the baptistery. The whole exterior displays a finely considered employment of the two shades of brick. The west end faces the church hall (q.v.), symmetrically placed opposite it, and with which it forms a group. INTERIOR: the whole ensemble is particularly fine. Giant semi-circular head concrete transverse arches project at intervals along the nave wall and separate the side spaces which are like side-chapels. Arches in the sides of these spaces form narrow chapel aisles. The nave roof between the giant arches is divided into blue-painted panels and the wooden cornice has finely carved gilded letters forming an inscription. Below in the centre of each bay is a finely carved bracket holding an elaborate metalwork lantern. The chancel arch is also round-arched and has a pair of finely carved canted pulpits with back panels and elaborate testers backing onto its piers. The chancel east window has stained glass which sails above a very elaborate carved reredos in late Gothic style of white marble with a granite frame and with centre panels of the Nativity, Crucifixion and Supper at Emmaus with figures in high relief. Below is the finely carved wooden altar in similar style with Renaissance details. There are very finely carved choir stalls in the same style with the choir balcony above on the north side and a set of organ pipes on the south both again with fine carving. The west gallery has a carved front and is supported on wooden square piers. Underneath is the baptistery with a finely carved stone font with carved figures in high relief, part bowl on a pedestal but four sides continuing to the ground with high relief figures in miniature niches. The whole stands on an octagonal stepped plinth. Behind is the wide bow window with five stained glass windows.

HISTORY: the interior of this church is a masterly composition contrasting the austere structural lines with the elaborate late Gothic and Renaissance style fittings. The darker nave leads to the lighter and higher chancel. It shows the interwar interest in Southern European styles but may also reflect the ideas expressed by Sir Ninian Comper at the time of 'unity by inclusion', that is the combining of Gothic and Classical elements to make a compelling whole, and by current ideas of having a wider nave with the altar more united with the body of the church and clearly the focal point.

SUMMARY OF IMPORTANCE: church of 1933-35 by A.D.R. Caröe and A.P Robinson. Of clear special architectural interest for its fusion of Romanesque and modern styles; its powerful interior; its impressive detailing; and its overall monumentality.

Sources: Information from Oliver Caroe, via Norwich City Council.

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:: 493869
Legacy System:: LBS

Sources

Books and journals
Symondson, A, 'The Twentieth Century Church' in Unity by Inclusion, (1998), 19-42

Legal

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