St John the Divine's Church, Morecambe

St John the Divine's Church, Morecambe
St John the Divine's Church, Morecambe Location in Morecambe
Coordinates: 54°03′29″N 2°53′15″W / 54.0580°N 2.8876°W
OS grid reference	SD 420 628
Location	Draycombe Drive, Sandylands, Morecambe, Lancashire
Country	England
Denomination	Anglican
Website	St John the Divine, Morecambe
Architecture
Status	Parish church
Functional status	Active
Heritage designation	Grade II
Designated	20 January 1993
Architect(s)	Austin and Paley
Architectural type	Church
Style	Gothic Revival
Groundbreaking	1898
Completed	1901
Specifications
Materials	Sandstone
Administration
Parish	St John Sandylands
Deanery	Lancaster and Morecambe
Archdeaconry	Lancaster
Diocese	Blackburn
Province	York
Clergy
Vicar(s)	Revd Linda Mcluskie
Laity
Reader(s)	Anne Woodhead
Churchwarden(s)	Michael Knight Catherine Park
Parish administrator	Mrs M Parker

St John the Divine's Church is in Draycombe Drive, Sandylands, Morecambe, Lancashire, England. It is an active Anglican parish church in the deanery of Lancaster and Morecambe, the archdeaconry of Lancaster, and the diocese of Blackburn.^[1] The church is recorded in the National Heritage List for England as a designated Grade II listed building.^[2]

History

The church was built between 1898 and 1901 to a design by the Lancaster architects Austin and Paley.^[3] It cost about £7,000 (equivalent to £690,000 in 2015),^[4] and provided seating for 600 people.^[5]

Architecture

Exterior

St John's is constructed in sandstone rubble with ashlar dressings. The roofs are also in sandstone, other than the tower and the porch that are roofed in aluminium. Its plan consists of a nave with a clerestory, north and south aisles, a south porch, a tower at the crossing with a north vestry and a south transept, and a chancel. The nave is in five bays with an extra shorter bay at the west end.^[2] The windows contain Perpendicular tracery, other than the chancel, which has a pair of windows with Decorated tracery.^[2][3] The west window has four lights, and is flanked by buttresses. Each of the clerestory windows has four lights under segmental heads; the aisle windows have two or three lights under flat heads. Above the doorway of the porch is a niche in a gable surmounted by a cross finial. In the transept is a two-light south window with panels above and below containing blind tracery. The chancel has two two-light south windows. The tower and the associated stair turret were not finished; the turret contains a bellcote.^[2]

Interior

The arcades are in five bays and are carried on octagonal piers. Between the nave and the crossing is a low alabaster wall that incorporates the pulpit. The chancel roof is carried on corbels carved with gilded angels.^[2][3] The font has a cover carved in the shape of a building with a spire. The windows contain stained glass dating between 1920 and 1994.^[3] The two-manual organ was built in about 1901 by Albert Keates, and was rebuilt in about 1930 by Rushworth and Dreaper.^[6]

See also

• List of ecclesiastical works by Austin and Paley (1895–1914)

References

1. St John the Divine, Sandylands, Church of England, retrieved 13 March 2012
2. Historic England, "Church of St John the Divine, Lancaster (1208908)", National Heritage List for England, retrieved 26 January 2012
3. Hartwell, Clare; Pevsner, Nikolaus (2009) [1969], Lancashire: North, The Buildings of England, New Haven and London: Yale University Press, pp. 457–458, ISBN 978-0-300-12667-9
4. UK CPI inflation numbers based on data available from Gregory Clark (2016), "The Annual RPI and Average Earnings for Britain, 1209 to Present (New Series)" MeasuringWorth.
5. Brandwood, Geoff; Austin, Tim; Hughes, John; Price, James (2012), The Architecture of Sharpe, Paley and Austin, Swindon: English Heritage, pp. 161, 243, ISBN 978-1-84802-049-8
6. Lancashire, Morecambe, St. John, St. John's Rd, Sandylands (S00053), British Institute of Organ Studies, retrieved 26 January 2012