Northumberland County Council

Listed building outline: Church Of St Paul 1041438

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Church Of St Paul 1041438

• geometry: MULTIPOLYGON (((-1.706554 55.411221,-1.706639 55.411218,-1.706633...
• entry-date: 2013-08-19
• listed-building: 1041438
• name: Church Of St Paul
• notes: PERCY STREET 1. 5330 (East Side) Church of St Paul NU 1813 SE 1/85 20.2.52. B 2. 1846 by Anthony Salvin for the 3rd Duke of Northumberland in decorated style. Large stone built church. Five bay aisled rave with a lower 2 bay aisled chancel and an embattled west tower with diagonal buttresses. Tower of 4 stages: entrance with pointed arch of 2 orders, a window above with decorated tracery, a clock on 3rd stage. Decorated tracery to aisle and clerestory windows and to large east window. Small rose at east end of nave. Projecting north porch with pointed arch of 2 orders and shallow painted niches with cusped heads in spandrels; an octopartite vault inside carried on head corbels. Vestries at south-east end. The interior has slender, keeled shafts to feinted arcades with label stops. Nave has an octopartite wooden vault, the chancel an arch braced collar beam roof. Splendid stained glass in east window designed by John Dyce and made by Ainmiller of Munich 1856. Monument to 3rd Duke (died 1847) by J.E. Carew. Oak pews with blind tracery in front and carved ends. Amended 23-AUG-2010: Built 1845-6 to designs by Anthony Salvin. MATERIALS: squared stone rubble, slate roofs. PLAN: Nave with N and S aisles, W tower and N porch. Chancel with N and S chapels and S vestry. EXTERIOR: the church stands in an area of early C19 housing and is situated in an attractive churchyard fringed with trees. The exterior is substantial and plain, in a Decorated style that is simple, but reasonably archaeologically correct. Large and tall W tower, as wide as the nave. Of four stages with diagonal buttresses, it has a C14-style W doorway of three chamfered orders, with a two-light window above it. The third stage is very tall and has paired windows, and there are large Decorated-style bell openings in the upper stage. Blocky, embattled parapet. The aisles have two-light windows with flowing tracery with buttresses between. The S porch has an outer doorway with a moulded arch on grouped shafts flanked by cinquefoil headed niches.; there are trefoiled lancets in the side walls. Inside is an ambitious stone vault with foliate bosses on head corbels. The nave, aisle and chancel roofs are steeply pitched, without parapets, and the clerestory windows are a uniform two-light design. The chancel has diagonal buttresses and mostly paired lancet windows. The five-light E window has curvilinear tracery with good archaeological precedent. Above it, in the chancel E gable is a circular window with swirling tracery. The N chapel is shorter than the chancel and has paired lights in the N wall and a two-light E window. The S vestry and chapel are distinguished by a cross-gable on the vestry. INTERIOR: Like the exterior, the interior is in a Decorated style. The five bay N and S arcades are uniform and have quatrefoil, clustered piers and double chamfered arches, and the chancel arch is in a similar style. Tall tower arch. Both the N and S chancel chapels have arches to the aisles, and the chapels open to the chancel arches with labels with head stops on the inner faces. The nave windows have very deep, almost straight-sided reveals. The nave has a timber vault, resting on short colonettes springing from head corbels, that was inserted c1865. The aisle roofs are boarded and have curved braces on corbel heads. PRINCIPAL FIXTURES: Exceptionally fine E window of St Paul and St Barnabas preaching of 1856, inserted in memory of the 3rd Duke of Northumberland: designed by the noted artist William Dyce (1806-64) and executed in Munich by Ainmuller. Octagonal stone font of 1846 with cusped tracery on the bowl and ball flower on the edge. The timber altar of 1846 has timber arcading along its front. Reredos and gothic-style sanctuary panelling with blind ogee arches of 1859. Octagonal oak pulpit with traceried panels, probably also 1846. Choir stalls with poppyheads and open traceried fronts. Altar rails with trefoil arcading. The fittings of the lady Chapel, the reredos and stations of the cross were brought to the church when it became Roman Catholic. The monument of the 3rd duke of Northumberland, d.1847 by J E Carew shows the aristocrat, resplendent in his coronet, asleep; he is buried elsewhere. HISTORY: St Paul's was built in 1845-6 to serve a growing residential district, and cost about #12,000. It was paid for mainly by the 3rd Duke of Northumberland. The architect, Anthony Salvin (1799-1881) was a significant figure in the late Georgian and early Victorian Gothic Revival. Born in Worthing, he was a pupil of little-known architect named John Paterson (d.1832) and worked in the office of John Nash. He set up in independent practice in 1828 and early on showed his ability to create buildings in an impressively authentic medieval style. He is also well known for a range of country house work, most notably his work on Alnwick Castle, where he worked for the 4th Duke of Northumberland between 1854 and 1860. The E window, installed in 1856 as a memorial to the 3rd duke, cost #1639 5s, of which #816 2 1d was raised by public subscription. The rest was paid by the 4th Duke of Northumberland. The designer, William Dyce (1806-1864), was a very influential artist who also executed the cartoons for the historical wall paintings in the Houses of Parliament and the decoration on the E wall of All Saints, Margaret Street, London. There was further refurnishing in the chancel in memory of Edward Bryan, curate, who drowned while bathing at Alnmouth in 1859. The church became redundant in 1979, and was converted to the Roman Catholic use; some re-ordering has gone on in recent times. REASONS FOR DESIGNATION: The church of St Paul, Alnwick, is designated at Grade II* for the following principal reasons: * parish church built 1845-6 in a Decorated style to designed by Salvin and funded by the 3rd Duke of Northumberland * exceptionally fine E window designed by Dyke and made by Ainmuller of Munich, and a notable ducal tomb. * it forms part of a contemporaneous development, showing the role of the 3rd Duke in the expansion of the town, and his eagerness to provide spiritual welfare.
• reference: 1041438
• start-date: 1952-02-20