South Acton: All Saints
Overview
Grid reference: TQ 201 795
The church is large, designed in a High Victorian Decorated style of angular details and big geometrical masses, and dominates Bollo Bridge Road because of the tall south-west tower, of four stages with setback buttresses and sparse fenestration.
Visiting and facilities
Building is closed for worship
Building
Ground Plan Description and Dimensions
Ground plan:
Five-bay nave with aisles and clerestory; south-west tower outside the south aisle; west porch; chancel with polygonal apse, south chapel, north organ chamber; south-west vestry.
Description of Archaeology and History
The architects were M.B. Adams and John Kelly of Leeds. The foundation stone was laid on All Saints Day 1871 and the church was consecrated on 26 September 1872. At the south-east a vestry was added in 1895 to designs of Edward Monson, a churchwarden; the builders were Dorey and Company.
Exterior Description
The church is large, designed in a High Victorian Decorated style of angular details and big geometrical masses, and dominates Bollo Bridge Road because of the tall south-west tower, of four stages with setback buttresses and sparse fenestration. The ground floor has a doorway under a two- centred arch with two orders of nook shafts in the south wall, the west wall being blind but banded with paired courses of blue bricks. This is much the tallest stage. The second stage has paired rectangular lights to all four directions with blind two-centred arches above each pair. The third stage is entirely blind but has recessed pairs of arches in each face and the uppermost stage, housing the bells, has big paired bell-openings with trefoil headed lights and quatrefoils above over which are placed skeletal clock faces of large dimensions with Roman numerals. A sharply pointed spire with lucarnes in four directions survived until the war but was eventually taken down and replaced with a simple parapet crowned by a flagpole.
The west gable of the nave is also a strong feature with a small porch at the foot provided with doorways in the canted angles and a three-light window under a gablet in the centre. The great west window has six main lights arranged in three pairs with circles above each pair containing quatrefoils and cinquefoils. The tracery consists of three circles containing two sexfoils and a quatrefoil of striking but unhistorical type. At the angles of the wall buttresses mark off the west aisle walls (provided with two-light windows) and the apex of the gable is decorated with patterns formed by lozenges of bricks set vertically instead of horizontally. The flanking walls of the nave have single three-light windows to each bay of the aisles (separated by buttresses) and the clerestory has three two-light windows to each bay, the centre window wider than the outer two, and the bays here divided by plain pilaster strips.
The chancel is short, with a five-sided apse having tall two-light windows which virtually fill each wall of the apse. The side walls have three cinquefoils under arches at clerestory level. The vestry at the south-east projects beyond the line of the south aisle and is gabled parallel to the church with windows in similar style to those of the main building, with simple geometrical tracery, and a cross-gable over the doorway in the centre of the south wall is pierced by a vesica piscis. The tympanum of the doorway, of stone, is carved with details of the date, architect, and so forth associated with this part of the building.
Building Fabric and Features
Stained Glass
1950
The five apse windows show Moses and Isaiah, The Annunciation, The Crucifixion, The Resurrection and St. Paul and St. Augustine: by Goddard and Gibbs.
Stained Glass
c.1880
The six small cinquefoils in the upper side walls of the chancel have musician angels, doubtless of c.1880 by Powell of Leeds
Stained Glass
c.1880
North aisle: the five three-light windows in the north wall and the small two-light window in the west wall retain their sections of the scheme which originally filled both aisles and the west nave window. Based on Old Testament teaching, these windows show (from west to east): Moses leading the Children of Israel through the Red Sea, Adam and Eve, Paradise Lost, Cain and Abel; Noah, Babel and Job; Abraham, Jacob and Joseph; Moses, Joshua and Deborah; Samuel, David and Solonan. All by Powell of Leeds
Stained Glass
c.1880
The south aisle retains two windows by Powell, depicting St. Columba St. Augustine and St. Osmund and St. Cyprian, St. Alban and St. Athanasius.
Stained Glass
c.1880
The great west window has glass by Powell and depicts, in six scenes from the Life of Moses, The Redemption of Israel out of Erypt, c.1880. The circular tracery lights are filled with floral and foliate patterns.
Stained Glass
Late 1880s
The clerestory lights are filled with glass by Clayton and Bell and depict: The Blessed Virgin Mary, and St. Matthias; St. Stephen and St. John the Divine; St. Luke and St. John the Evangelist; Annunciation and St. Mark; The Holy Innocents, and The Conversion of St. Paul and St. Andrew and St. Thomas.
Stained Glass
c.1895
The east window of the south chapel depicts Christ and the Doctors, The Virgin and Child and The Miracle at Cana.
Stained Glass
1874
The south window of the vestry contains glass representing Christ the Good Shepherd and Christ the Light of the World; this was made and presented by Charles and Albert Powell of Leeds.
Interior
Interior Description
The interior of the church is robust, certainly the hard lines and hot colour of the bricks and the remaining nineteenth-century stained glass have a powerful effect, although this has been mitigated by the white-washing of the walls in some areas, particularly in the south aisle. The structural polychromy is not very ambitious, and consists mostly of parallel lines of blue bricks on the wall surfaces and stone details such as the piers and capitals of the arcades, the wall shafts at clerestroy level and carved heads at the termination of the hoodmoulds above each pier. The stone tympana over the west and south doors are carved with sacrod monograms, lilies, passion flowers and grapes. The piers are quatrefoil in plan with moulded bases and foliated capitals. The arches which they carry are of three recessed orders of brickwork outlined by a moulding of pressed bricks. The clerestory windows have plain square imposts and between each pair of bays is a detached wall shaft with a foliated corbel and foliated capital supporting the principals of the roof. These have heavy arch braces supporting collars and the roof is also braced lengthwise, a simple and visually powerful design. The aisle roofs are quite plain with arch braces at each bay and both have altars at the east end. The north aisle has a children's corner created in 1930. The east end of the north aisle is terminated by an arch filled with organ pipes and the east end of the south aisle opens into a former chapel from which the altar was brought forward to the first bay of the aisle in 1932. The chapel is therefore now no more than an ante-chamber between vestry and chancel. The nave floor was repaved in the alleys with red and black tiles in 1888.
The chancel arch is tall and wide, almost as wide as the chancel itself, and is supported on paired shafts which rise the height of the responds. Twenty years after the church was built a delicate iron screen was placed across the arch and further alterations were made to the chancel later, the reredos being erected in 1935 and the stained glass replaced after war damage. The architectural structure, however, remains unaltered, with tall two-light windows filling each bay of the apse and shafts rising in each corner to support the curved and moulded ribs of the roof. Between these the roof is panelled. The floor is paved with tiles with simple patterns and there are paintings of the worship of heaven and earth round the lower parts of the walls. An arch on the north opens into the organ chamber and an arch on the south into the former chapel. Above each of these are three roundels with cinquefoil cusping filled with glass representing musican angels, and corbels for the roof timbers are carved as musician angels also.
Fixtures and fittings
Reredos
1935
The rerelos is of oak, in the form of a triptych with a central panel and folding doors. The central panel has blind Perpendicular tracery and the doors have tracery incorporating carved Art Nouveau roses and the small figures of St. Andrew and St. Peter painted in gold.
Pulpit
The pulpit is of stone, standing on four short colonettes and with figures of the four Evangelists in small niches at the corners.
Lectern
1897
The lectern is a fine brass eagle with an unusually elaborate pedestal incorporating three buttresses supporting small statuettes of St. Peter, St. John the Divine and St. James; three small medallions on the central stom show St. Augustine , St. Clement and St. Athanasius.
Lectern
c.1920
A lectern that is a simple oak pedestal of c.1920.
Font (object)
The font is of stone, octagonal with recessed panels showing The Covenant of the Rainbow, The Holy Spirit in the form of a dove, The cross and the martyr's crown and palms.
Organ (object)
The organ is a three manual instrument by Bishop, 260 Marylebone Road, London NW, and has tracker action and thirty-four speaking stops with three-rank Mixtures on Great and Swell and three reeds on the latter.
Screen
1891
The screen was erected in 1891 and the three steps of white marble at the entrance wore provided in 1905. The tall, wide central arch is flanked by three smaller bays on each side, all constructed of wrought iron with many stylised scrolls culminating in a cross above the entrance, the sort of metalwork which Blomfield favoured.
Churchyard
Grid reference: TQ 201 795
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 | N/A |
| Solar Thermal Panels | N/A |
| Biomass | N/A |
| Wind Turbine | N/A |
| Air Source Heat Pump | N/A |
| Ground Source Heat Pump | N/A |
| Ev Charging | N/A |
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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