Brentor Christ Church Basics
Listed building grade 1
Regularly open
Address
Christ Church
Station Road
North Brentor
Plymouth
PL19 0LR
Geographical coordinates
50°36’45.0″N 4°08’47.1″W (enter these in your smartphone navigator)
Devonchurchland says…
A whimsical little church, really a chapel of ease, that would not look out of place on a street in Torquay or Plymouth but is kind of cute here on the edge of Dartmoor.
The interior is modest and enchanting, bare stone walls, a beautiful set of Victorian stained glass windows by Beer of Exeter, and 1930s oak furniture.
The altar back is a pure magic in a Renaissance style by a famous early 20th century artist, Christopher Webb. It shows a Madonna and Child with Magi and shepherds either side.
There is another charming painting in the children’s corner of the same age, by Ernest Heasman another well known artist.
A very nice granite font too, with a equally good font cover.
A simple lovely all around. Well worth dropping into along with its more famous cousin up the road.
Outline
PLAN
- Shallow chancel
- Nave
- West tower
- North west porch
- South east vestry
AGE
- 1856 new build
- Designed by George Wightwick of Plymouth
- Built by Richard Gosling of Torquay
BUILT FROM
- Roughly dressed stone
- Granite dressings
- Slate roof
Exterior
WEST TOWER
- 3-stage
- Battlemented
- Semi-circular south stair turret
- Small rectangular chamfered stair windows
- Clasping buttresses
- With set-offs
- 2 moulded strings at base
- Granite band below parapet
- Octagonal corner pinnacles with finials
- North, south and west sides have chamfered lancets
- Hoodmoulds at bellringers’ stage
- Similar lancets with slate louvres at belfry stage
- North side has similar lancet at first stage
- Moulded arched west doorway
- With hoodmould
NAVE
- Clasping buttresses to east and west ends
- North and south sides have buttresses
- Quoins and set-offs
- Between moulded granite single lancet windows
- Lancets recessed
- With splayed sills
- Moulded granite string below
CHANCEL
- 2-bay
- Moulded coped gable
- Granite kneelers
- Triple lancet east window
- Below hoodmould with moulded corbels
PORCH
- Moulded coped gable
- Kneelers
- Moulded arched granite outer door
- Similar inner door
VESTRY
- South east
- 5-sided vestry
- Deep pyramidal roof
Interior
NAVE & CHANCEL
- Moulded granite chancel and tower arches
- Without capitals
- Narrow chamfered stopped doorway into vestry
- Nave windows have moulded granite inner arches
- East window has engaged shafts
- With bell capitals
- Granite font probably of 1856
- Bowl decorated with bold trefoils
- On stem of clustered shafts
- Font cover and other fittings 1930s
- When the plaster was removed from the walls
ROOFS
- 5-bay moulded arch brace roof to nave
- Heavily moulded purlins and wall plate
- Principals spring from moulded granite corbels
- Chancel roof collar rafter
STAINED GLASS
- Set of contemporary glass by Alfred Beer of Exeter
- Pictorial in the east window
- And the window opposite the north door
- Commemorating Isabella Holwell
- Window above pulpit has text on scroll
- Other windows quarries with borders
Other information
Chapel of Ease to the church of St Michael, Brentor.
Small Early English style chapel with variations.
Financed largely by Mrs Isabella Holwell, Admiral Octavius Vernon and Mrs Danby.
Stone rubble wall of 1856 surrounding churchyard to the south included for group value. Wall has granite capping and curves towards the north porch with granite gate piers with gabled caps.
The church cost £1,003 to build. Its unarchaeological gothic style is unusual in the Diocese of Exeter in the late 1850s.
This page contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0
