Our Lady and St Walstan RC Church
Our Lady and St Walstan RC Church, Town House 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:
- 1393711
- Date first listed:
- 05-Mar-2010
- List Entry Name:
- Our Lady and St Walstan RC Church
- Statutory Address:
- Our Lady and St Walstan RC Church, Town House Road
Location
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Discover moreOfficial list entry
- Heritage Category:
- Listed Building
- Grade:
- II
- List Entry Number:
- 1393711
- Date first listed:
- 05-Mar-2010
- List Entry Name:
- Our Lady and St Walstan RC Church
- Statutory Address 1:
- Our Lady and St Walstan RC Church, Town House Road
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
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.
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
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.
Location
- Statutory Address:
- Our Lady and St Walstan RC Church, Town House Road
The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.
- County:
- Norfolk
- District:
- South Norfolk (District Authority)
- Parish:
- Costessey
- National Grid Reference:
- TG 17293 11583
Reasons for Designation
Our Lady and St Walstan Roman Catholic church is recommended for designation at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
* It is a comparatively little-altered, good quality example of a Roman Catholic church of the 1830s when very few were built in East Anglia. * It was designed by J C Buckler and it reflects the ideas of Pugin, with whom Buckler was working at the time. * It shows innovation both in style, being First Pointed Gothic, and in plan-form, having a well-defined chancel. * It has good fittings and stained glass windows.
Details
This list entry was subjected to a Minor Enhancement on the 26 October 2022 to update the description and to reformat the text to current standards
1135/0/10001
COSTESSEY
TOWN HOUSE ROAD
Our Lady and St Walstan RC Church
05-MAR-10
II
Roman Catholic Church. 1834-41. By J.C. Buckler for the Jerningham family of Costessey Hall. Red brick laid in Flemish bond; pantiled nave, concrete tiled chancel. Plan of nave and chancel with C21 polygonal west porch.
EXTERIOR: large preaching nave of seven bays with stepped side buttresses separating tall single lancets. Angle buttresses to west end. Triple stepped lancets to west above single-storey west porch. Double stone bellcote to east nave gable, on brick plinth, lost upper stage with no bells. Lower two-bay chancel with single lancets north and south separated by stepped side buttresses. Three stepped lancets to east end.
INTERIOR: stone west gallery (doubling as organ loft) consisting of three double-chamfered arches on circular columns and responds. One stiff-leaf roundel in central spandrels. String course and plain parapet. Stone staircase in south-west corner, with panelled balustrade. North-west corner opposite partly filled in. West gallery decorated with two roundels of stiff-leaf sculpture and a hanging shield decorated with a crowned M and W. Panelled dado below nave windows. Roof of principals, secondary rafters and ridge piece. Chamfered chancel arch with roll-moulded hoodmould. Panelled chancel dado, raised for reredos with cresting only fully carved along the east wall. Circular font with arcade of trefoils in arches to the bowl gifted from Buckler. Stations of the Cross painted in oil on canvas within timber frames. There are numbered benches made for the Church, the ends topped with a roundel carved with a rose with letters of ‘ihu’ for Jesu and ‘Mercy’ in Gothic script. East chancel lancets with glass by James Grant, 1841, that in centre light probably replaced by Joseph Grant c. 1860. One south and one north chancel lancet with glass by James Grant, 1841. Below each lancet is a square Cossey red brick with a recessed cross.
HISTORY: J.C. Buckler was commissioned in about 1826 by the Jerningham family to begin remodelling Costessey Hall, the family seat, and in 1834 began a new Catholic church in the village when he had only the experience of remodelling the chancel at Adderbury, Oxfordshire, behind him. It took seven years to complete and during this time Buckler was working with Pugin on remodelling Oxburgh Hall and building its chapel, and will have known of his advanced ideas. Buckler was thus aware of the Gothic-Classical stylistic question and also of the move from Nonconformist design in Catholic circles, and this church is advanced in style and in one feature in plan-form as well. For style he chose the First Pointed, so the building relies on lancet windows, in the flanks separated by stepped buttresses. Entirely new for East Anglia and new even in England for a Roman Catholic church, however, is the provision of a well-defined chancel of two bays, separated on the interior by a pointed moulded chancel arch. The west end of the nave still has a gallery, here of stone and presenting three bold pointed arches. In the chancel are five important early stained glass windows by the Grant Bros.
SOURCES: Wilson, W, D, Roman Catholic Churches and Chapels in East Anglia, unpubd. report for English Heritage (1998)
REASONS FOR DESIGNATION: Our Lady and St Walstan Roman Catholic church is designated at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
* It is a comparatively little-altered, good quality example of a Roman Catholic church of the 1830s when very few were built in East Anglia. * It was designed by J C Buckler and it reflects the ideas of Pugin, with whom Buckler was working at the time. * It shows innovation both in style, being First Pointed Gothic, and in plan-form, having a well-defined chancel. * It has good fittings and stained glass windows.
Legacy
The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.
- Legacy System number:
- 501950
- 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.
Map
This map is for quick reference purposes only and may not be to scale. This copy shows the entry on 05-Jul-2026 at 18:05:32.
Download a full scale map (PDF)End of official list entry
All text content is available under the Open Government Licence v3.0 , except where otherwise stated. Any supplied maps are © Crown Copyright [and database rights] 2026 OS AC0000815036 and may not be reproduced without permission.