Description

TL 3629 BUNTINGFORD HIGH STREET
(west side)

7/38 Church of St Peter
(C of E)
22.2.67

GV I

Chapel of Ease, now a church. Circa 1615 (inscription stone with
'Domus Orationis 1615' on E gable) for vicar Dr Alexander
Strange. Restored 1899-1900 by W A Pite renewing windows
restoring W gallery and adding N porch, and vestry/heating
chamber in SW angle. Red brick in English-bond with steep tiled
roofs. An unusual Jacobean town preaching house in Greek cross
form orientated with chancel and semi-circular apse at S and
entrance under clock and bell at N. Gothic Survival style with
tall moulded brick windows with blunt pointed heads in similar
moulded arches recesses. 2 small pointed lights in upper W
gable, gable parapets with moulded copings, finialled corbelled
kneelers and squared apex finials, offset plinth, step-corbelled
eaves, broad pilaster buttresses to apse alternating with pointed
windows (heightened and refaced in 1900). Arched bellcote on N
gable and later porch. Interior has flattened barrel-vaulted
roof E-W, against which short similar vaulted roofs abutt to N
and S. Timber ceiling renewed but original heavy cambered hollow-
chamfered tie-beams remain with hollow-chamfered braces rising
from wallposts on corbels, 2 to each arm of the church. Pointed
arch of 2 chamfered orders into apse. Billet moulded cresting at
wallplate all round church. Heavy ovolo-moulded beam at front of
galley across W arm of church carried on 4 wooden Ionic columns
(volutes orientated at right angles to beam), with tall pedestals
one with strapwork carving on E face, another plain with housing
for a bench end. Pentagonal font with moulded base, panelled
stem and bowl decorated with arabesque ornament and bosses.
Framed engraved brass plate with view of interior of chapel in
1622 during service inscribed to Alexander Strange who 'fecit
hanc Capellam'. Large iron clock movement on wooden frame in E
arm. (Layston Parish Mag XXX November 1900: RCHM (1911) 138-9:
VCH (1914) 87: Kelly (1914) 74: Pevsner (1977) 117).

Listing NGR: TL3630729324

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q17529000

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Oxfordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Bristol (Pevsner Architectural Guides: City Guides)
• 
  Georgian Style and Design for Contemporary Living
• 
  Yorkshire West Riding: Sheffield and the South (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  London 4: North: North v. 4 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  [(Shropshire)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1958)