Belgrave: St Michael & All Angels
Overview
Grid reference: SK 596 64
The church is a simple essay in the Early English style which architects such as Vialls and the Cutts brothers liked to use at the turn of the 20th century.
Visiting and facilities
Building is closed for worship
Building
Ground Plan Description and Dimensions
Ground plan:
Nave of five and a half bays with passage aisles to the two western main bays and porches in the shallower west bay; small baptistery projecting in the centre of the west wall. Chancel with north vestries and south chapel. The two eastern bays of the aisles were intended to have cross-gabled chapels, but these were never built, and the south chapel occupies a site further east. The third bay of the nave from the east also lacks the intended passage aisles.
Description of Archaeology and History
The church was designed by George Vialls. The foundation stone was laid by the Right Reverend William Connor Magee, Bishop of Peterborough (in which diocese Leicester then lay) on 30 September 1885, and the church was consecrated by him on 22 September 1887. A south Lady Chapel was added to designs by G.A. Cope in 1937 to commemorate the Golden Jubilee of the church; it was consecrated by Bishop Cyril Bardsley of Leicester on 28 September that year. The church replaced an iron church erected on this site in 1878, and was intended as a memorial to Mr. Alfred Ellis and Canon Henry John Burfield.
Exterior Description
The church is a simple essay in the Early English style which architects such as Vialls and the Cutts brothers liked to use at the turn of the 20th century. It allows for large spaces to be roofed in a dignified fashion without too much money having to be spent on details. The west front is the show-piece, since it faces the road. It has octagonal turrets with buttresses and stone caps at each end and is divided into three equal bays by deep, narrow buttresses between. The bays are each pierced by a two-light window with a quatrefoil in the head and, while the outer two bays are blind between the sills and the ground, the middle bay has a small gabled projection lit by a circular window which houses the font. The turrets are connected by a parapetted walkway on segmental arches above the three windows, and the gable above has four lancets and a cusped vesica piscis.
The flanking walls of the nave were intended to have bays of three different designs. First comes the short windowless west bay, from which project porches to north and south with arched doorways of four receding orders of brickwork and blind arcading on the west faces with some arches pierced for windows. The next two bays have small passage aisles in the lower part, lit by tiny lancets, and tall paired lancets within recessed arches above. The easternmost of these three bays on both flanks of the building lacks the intended passage aisle. Then come two cross-gabled bays, still filled with the temporary brickworkpierced with taller pairs of lancets, where chapels were intended to be built. The roof line continues yet one bay further east (for inside the church the chancel in fact reaches one bay out into the nave on a raised platform), and this final bay has vestries on the north side and the later Lady Chapel of 1937 on the south side. This is of three bays with two-light windows in the south wall with minimal gothic tracery, while in the west wall are three blind arches, again prepared to open into the south nave chapel which has not been built. The east wall has a window shaped as a vesica with cusped tracery round a central cross. The chancel which projects eastward from the nave in fact houses only the sanctuary and has one lancet in the north and south walls and five large lancets in the east wall with heads reaching up into the gable; the sills of the middle three are at a higher level than the outer pair to allow for a reredos within.
Building Fabric and Features
Stained Glass
Various
The five east lancets are filled with glass arranged in two tiers; the upper parts of the three middle lights have The Nativity, The Crucifixion and The Resurrection with St. George, St. Michael and St. Martin below; the outer lights have Judas Maccabeaus Joshua, St. Oswald and St. Alban. The middle light dates from 1894 and the outer four lights are a War Memorial of 1920 by William Pearce of Birmingham.
Stained Glass
1894
Two small windows high in the east wall of each aisle depict St. Peter and St. Paul
Stained Glass
1957
East window of south aisle at the lower level : St. John
Stained Glass
The two south windows of the Lady Chapel depict The Presentation in the Temple and Christ and the Doctors, with figures set against clear glass in the lower parts of the lights, by Joseph E. Nuttgens.
Stained Glass
c.1890
South nave clerestory, two lights, depicting two female saints, by Mayer of Munich
Stained Glass
1932
West baptistery roundel : Christ and the Children
Interior
Interior Description
The interior is spacious and quite dignified, much of the dignity being derived from the fine roof modelled on Italian examples with continuous coving above the walls and then an open timber structure in the middle with tie-beams and kingposts. The walls are arcaded with one large round-headed arch to each bay. The three western bays (apart from the narrow westernmost bay which only has the doorways) have two tiers of subsidiary arches, three below leading into the tiny passage aisles and two above for the windows, with a quatrefoil pierced in each spandrel. The two eastern bays have a quatrefoil pillar between with the capital left uncarved, and brick walls painted white close the openings to the non-existent chapels. The easternmost bay follows a different pattern. It is distinguished from the rest by ringed shafts with foliate capitals rising from floor to ceiling, and has arches which are canted inwards towards the narrower sanctuary, a feature also used by Pearson and Street. The choirstalls are placed within a raised chorus cantorum in this bay, with passages on each side leading eastwards. On the north is the organ chamber and on the south the Lady Chapel. The floor is paved with wood blocks, with red, black and buff tiles in the alleys.
The sanctuary occupies the space which is architecturally distinguished from the nave, and again is raised yet further by three steps above the level of the choir, both areas having red, brown and bright yellow tiles on the floor. There are three more steps at the altar which, with the one at the rails embellished with a text along the font, means that the altar is ten steps above the floor level of the nave. The chancel arch has slender ringed shafts against the responds with foliate capitals and the arch itself is moulded. Arches to left and right Communicate with lobbies at the ends of the aisles. The side walls are plain below but have arcading above, of five bays of which one is pierced for a window on each side. The five lancets in the east wall are shafted and a reredos to fit below the sills has never been provided, the present (later) arrangement being of the "English" tradition, with an oak panelled reredos of long, low proportions and riddels at each side. In the south wall are three sedilia under pointed chamfered arches carried by shafts with foliate capitals. To the east of these is a piscina with a shelf and on the north wall is a credence shelf. The roof is a boarded wooden vault.
The south chapel is in a pared-down Perpendicular style with a low-pitched roof and simple tracery in the south windows. The walls are plastered and whitened but the windows and the three blind arches in the west all have the stonework left exposed. The east window has a stone statue of the Virgin and Child set against the tracery.
Fixtures and fittings
Altar
c.1930
The altar is of oak with a panelled front decorated in the middle panel with a roundel of The Pelican in Her Piety carved in relief.
Reredos
1935
The reredos is of oak, with ten traceried panels arranged singly and in pairs with various shields including those of the diocese and the province; at the sides are riddel posts surmounted by angels with candles.
Pulpit
c.1887
The pulpit is of stone painted white, hexagonal on a much moulded base with trefoiled blind panels in each face of the body and foliate decoration in a trail on the cornice.
Lectern
c.1887
The lectern is a walnut desk with two slopes set so that it may pivot on an iron base.
Font (object)
1887
The font has a circular stone bowl with four lobes supported on four shafted marble colonettes which stand well away from the relatively small drum. All is decorated with nailhead and the colonettes have stylised foliate capitals.
Organ (object)
1894
The organ is a two-manual instrument by Taylor of Leicester.
Screen
c.1946
A screen between the chapel and the nave is of oak in a simple Perpendicular style, with glazed panels.
Rail
c.1930
The communion rails are of pale oak.
Rail
1937
The communion rails in the Lady Chapel are of iron with oak capping.
Churchyard
Grid reference: SK 596 64
Burial and War Grave Information
It is unknown whether the building is consecrated.
It is unknown whether the churchyard has been used for burial.
It is unknown whether the churchyard is used for burial.
It is unknown whether the churchyard has war graves.
National Heritage record for England designations
There are no records of National Heritage assets within the curtilage of this site.
Environment
Ancient, Veteran & Notable Trees
Caring for God's Acre is a conservation charity working to support groups and individuals to investigate, care for, and enjoy the wildlife and heritage treasures found within churchyards and other burial grounds. Look on their website for information and advice and please contact their staff directly. They can help you manage this churchyard for people and wildlife.
To learn more about all the species recorded against this church, go to the Burial Ground Portal within the NBN Atlas. You can check the spread of records through the years, discovering what has been recorded and when, plus what discoveries might remain to be uncovered.
There are no records of Ancient, Veteran or Notable Trees within the curtilage of this site.
Renewables
| Renewable | Installed |
|---|---|
| Solar PV Panels | No |
| Solar Thermal Panels | No |
| Biomass | No |
| Wind Turbine | No |
| Air Source Heat Pump | No |
| Ground Source Heat Pump | No |
| Ev Charging | No |
Species summary
There are no records of species within the curtilage of this site.
Caring for God's Acre is a conservation charity working to support groups and individuals to investigate, care for, and enjoy the wildlife and heritage treasures found within churchyards and other burial grounds. Look on their website for information and advice and please contact their staff directly. They can help you manage this churchyard for people and wildlife.
To learn more about all the species recorded against this church, go to the Burial Ground Portal within the NBN Atlas. You can check the spread of records through the years, discovering what has been recorded and when, plus what discoveries might remain to be uncovered.
'Seek advice' Species
More information on species and action to be taken upon discovery.
Caring for God's Acre is a conservation charity working to support groups and individuals to investigate, care for, and enjoy the wildlife and heritage treasures found within churchyards and other burial grounds. Look on their website for information and advice and please contact their staff directly. They can help you manage this churchyard for people and wildlife.
To learn more about all the species recorded against this church, go to the Burial Ground Portal within the NBN Atlas. You can check the spread of records through the years, discovering what has been recorded and when, plus what discoveries might remain to be uncovered.
Further information
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