BAPTIST CHAPEL

BAPTIST CHAPEL, CHAPEL ROAD

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

Overview

A Strict Baptist chapel of 1830, incorporating a fragment of the previous chapel of 1800, with later C19 remodelling. Read the official list entry to find out more.

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1393237
Date first listed:: 22-Apr-2009
List Entry Name:: BAPTIST CHAPEL
Statutory Address:: BAPTIST CHAPEL, CHAPEL ROAD

The Missing Pieces Project

Share your view of unique places. Almost 350,000 photos and stories have been added so far.

Add your contribution

Location

Location of this list entry and nearby places that are also listed. Use our map search to find more listed places.

There is a problem

Use of this mapping is subject to terms and conditions.

This map is for quick reference purposes only and may not be to scale.

What is the National Heritage List for England?

The National Heritage List for England is a unique register of our country's most significant historic buildings and sites. The places on the list are protected by law and most are not open to the public.

The list includes:

🏠 Buildings
🏰 Scheduled monuments
🌳 Parks and gardens
⚔️ Battlefields
⚓ Shipwrecks

Find out more about listing

Historic England Archive

Search over 1 million photographs and drawings from the 1850s to the present day using our images archive.

Find Photos

Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1393237
Date first listed:: 22-Apr-2009
List Entry Name:: BAPTIST CHAPEL
Statutory Address 1:: BAPTIST CHAPEL, CHAPEL 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:: BAPTIST CHAPEL, CHAPEL ROAD

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

County:: Suffolk
District:: East Suffolk (District Authority)
Parish:: Otley
National Grid Reference:: TM2074355773

Reasons for Designation

The Grace Baptist Chapel at Otley is designated for the following principal reasons: * It has an intact exterior which possesses simple and modest classical detailing. * Interior fixtures and fittings of the early and later C19 date remain including a three-sided gallery with ramped pews. * It is comparable in architectural quality and intactness with other listed Baptist chapels of similar date.

Details

OTLEY

1219/0/10013 CHAPEL ROAD 22-APR-09 Baptist Chapel

II A Strict Baptist chapel of 1830, incorporating a fragment of the previous chapel of 1800, with later C19 remodelling.

MATERIALS It is constructed of red brick laid in Flemish bond with a gault brick front and a overhanging hipped slate roof.

PLAN The chapel is rectangular in plan with a single storey brick addition with hipped roof to the west and remodelled outbuildings to the north-west.

EXTERIOR The façade facing south has three bays and two end entrances with C20 doors and an eight-over-twelve sash window with late C19 shutters in between. All openings have detailed stone heads. Above are three eight-over-eight sash windows. The north elevation, which incorporates the remaining wall of the chapel of c1800, has a pair of eight-over-twelve sash windows at ground floor and eight-over-eight sash windows at first floor. They are probably of c. 1830 date and replace a pair of larger windows, the blocked openings of which are apparent between the two sets. There is a small inserted C20 window to the right. The four-bay east and west elevations have pairs of sash windows at ground and first floor. The addition on the west elevation has a central four-panelled door flanked by metal-framed casement windows of 20 lights with C19 panelled shutters.

The former stables, converted into a meeting room, lies in the cemetery to the south of the chapel.

INTERIOR The room attached to the west of the chapel has a boarded cupboard with HL hinge and stairs leading to the north-west gallery above. An off-centre door leads into the chapel. A stepped pulpit of late C19 date is located at the north side, with a smaller C20 lectern to the front, enclosed by a rail comprising turned balusters and a rounded handrail on a timber plinth. The baptistery lies to the front and comprises a brick tank, originally fed by rainwater. The ground floor pews are later C19. On the west, south and east sides, is a panelled gallery supported on slender, round metal columns with ramped pews to the east and west. There are winding stairs at the south-east and south-west corner leading from the small porches at the entrances up to the gallery. The ramped pews on the west gallery appear to be of early C19 date and there are benches and an instructors¿ desk in the south arm where the Sunday school took place. There is a simple cornice, and metal ventilation grilles and at the centre of the ceiling, a large oval recess which may have had a skylight originally. There are three memorials, one on the south wall to the fallen of World War I, and the others to former Ministers, Rev. Edmonds and Rev. Woodgate.

SOURCES Stell, C. 2002 'Chapels and Meeting House in Eastern England. English Heritage. www.strictbaptisthistory.org.uk

HISTORY The formal history of Baptist non-conformity began in England with John Smyth (d. 1612), an ordained Anglican minister, who in 1607 separated from the Established Church and introduced the Baptism of adult believers as the foundation of Church membership. The Strict Baptist church (later known as the Association of Grace Baptist Chapels) split from the main Baptist movement in 1829 following a doctrinal difference of opinion principally concerning the restriction of communion to church members. The establishment of the Strict Baptists took place in Grundisburgh in 1829, some 3 miles to the south-east of Otley and the chapel, originally constructed in 1800, was remodelled in 1830. The earliest chapel was very small, the remnant being the north wall of the current building. The expanding congregation demanded a substantial extension to the building, increasing the size four-fold and necessitating the construction of a new roof. The 1830 chapel had a gallery on all sides, the north arm of which was located behind the pulpit and accommodated the choir. This arm has long since been removed, but the stairs to it remain. The communal room was later attached to the west of the chapel and in the C20 this facility was augmented by the construction of a kitchen in an outbuilding at the north-west corner of the chapel. The two entrance doors on the façade have been replaced, as has the window shutter. Internally part of the gallery was rebuilt in 1868 and the pulpit in use is C20 matching the stepped pulpit to the rear which is later C19 in date.

REASONS FOR DESIGNATION DECISION The Grace Baptist Chapel at Otley is designated for the following principal reasons: * It has an intact exterior which possesses simple and modest classical detailing. * Interior fixtures and fittings of the early and later C19 date remain including a three-sided gallery with ramped pews. * It is comparable in architectural quality and intactness with other listed Baptist chapels of similar date.

TM2074355773

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:: 505718
Legacy System:: LBS

Sources

Books and journals
Stell, C, An Inventory of Nonconformist Chapels and Meeting-Houses in Eastern England, (2002)

Legal

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