Details
SJ 75 NW CREWE UNION STREET
(North side)
153/2/10014
Union Street Baptist Church
10.03.1999 And attached boundary wall
And railings
II
Baptist church and attached vestry, meeting rooms and offices, boundary wall and railing. 1884, by J Wallis-Chapman.
Red brick, with ashlar dressings and plain tile roofs. Eclectic style, mainly with Gothic elements. Rectangular church with stair turrets and spire at west end, vestry and meeting room forming T -plan cross range at east end.
Church, 5 bays, has plinth, buttresses, sill band, rebated brick eaves, coped gables and crested ridge tiles.
West gable has rebated pointed-arched doorway with hoodmould, containing C20 panelled double doors with mullioned overlight, flanked by single plain lancets. Above, a round window with Decorated tracery and hoodmould. To south, a stair turret, 3 stages, topped with a timber-framed octagonal lantern. Ground floor has a door in a round arched recess, flanked to left by a single lancet. Above, 3 lancets under a flat head. Upper stage and lantern have patterned timber framing with rendered infill panels. Upper stage has half-hipped roof, single square window to west, and 2-light window to south. Lantern has wooden-framed cross-windows in the upper stage, and an octagonal pyramidal roof with a tall finial. To north, a canted stair turret, 2 stages. To west, a porch with chamfered doorway and mullioned overlight, under a hipped stone roof. To right, a single lancet. Upper stage has continuous glazing with leaded lights, under a hipped roof.
North and south sides have in each bay 2 lancets, and above, a flat-headed 3-light window. At the north east end, a projecting square stair turret, with a pointed arched doorway and double doors, set in a chamfered 4-centred arched recess. Above, a traceried cross-mullioned window, 3 lights. Beyond, the canted end bay of the cross range, with 6-light windows on each floor, re-glazed late C20.
Cross range, 3 bays, has segment-headed 3-light windows in each bay on each floor, those above with narrower sidelights. South gable has a central external gable stack, flanked by 2 windows on the ground floor, and single windows above, the latter glazing bar sashes. Gabled side bays have 2 windows on each floor, those above flat-headed.
INTERIOR: Church has an all-round wooden gallery with pierced front, carried on slender cast-iron columns. Arch-braced hammer beam roof with sham clerestorey, matchboard ceiling and numerous tie rods. Raking floor with original pine benches. At the front, raised platform covering cruciform tiled baptistry. Traceried pine pulpit, flanked by half-glazed doors. Above, on the gallery, panelled organ case with show pipes. At the rear, S lancets, flanked by pairs of half-glazed doors. Similar single doors on the gallery. All the church windows have patterned stained glass. Tiled entrance vestibule has open well stone staircases with double iron stick balusters and ramped handrails. .
Cross range has similar staircase. Ground floor has large meeting room with glazed screens and folding partition. On the first floor, a hall with stage and flanking dressing rooms, with arch-braced principal rafter roof. Rooms mainly retain original match board dadoes and doors. MEMORIALS: none.
OUTSIDE: Blue brick boundary wall with chamfered ashlar coping and topped with a railing, along west and north fronts. Square blue brick piers with ashlar caps to double gates at west entrance. Similar piers, blue brick and red brick, with double gates to north side entrance, and similar piers to a wooden gate leading to the rear range.
Listing NGR: SJ7062055054
