Survey Data

Reg No

22814002


Rating

Regional


Categories of Special Interest

Architectural, Artistic, Historical, Social


Original Use

Church/chapel


In Use As

Church/chapel


Date

1820 - 1825


Coordinates

249549, 99064


Date Recorded

12/06/2003


Date Updated

--/--/--


Description

Detached two-bay double-height single-cell Board of First Fruits Church of Ireland church, built 1822, on a rectangular plan; single-bay three-stage tower (south) on a square plan. Pitched slate roof with clay or terracotta ridge tiles, cut-limestone coping to gables, and cast-iron rainwater goods on rendered eaves with cast-iron downpipes. Rendered walls on rendered plinth; rendered surface finish (tower) on rendered chamfered plinth with rendered piers to corners (upper stages) framing battlemented parapets. Lancet window openings with cut-limestone sills, and concealed dressings framing iron mesh storm panels over fixed-pane fittings having leaded stained glass margins centred on leaded stained glass lozenges. Pointed-arch door opening (south) with cut-limestone surround framing timber boarded door having overpanel. Square-headed blind openings (second stage). Lancet openings (bell stage) with concealed dressings framing louvered fittings. Interior including vestibule (south); full-height interior with limestone flagged central aisle between timber pews, timber boarded wainscoting with timber dado rail, pair of Classical-style wall monuments (----; ----), cornice to ceiling, and pointed-arch chancel arch framing carpeted stepped dais to chancel (north) with arcaded communion railing centred on altar table below stained glass window. Set in landscaped grounds with limestone ashlar piers to perimeter having cut-limestone shallow pyramidal capping.

Appraisal

A church representing an integral component of the early nineteenth-century ecclesiastical heritage of County Waterford with the architectural value of the composition, 'a neat edifice erected by aid of a gift of £900 from the late Board of First Fruits [fl. 1711-1833]' (Lewis 1837 I, 30), suggested by such attributes as the standardised nave-with-entrance tower plan form; the slender profile of the openings underpinning a "medieval" Gothic theme; and the battlements embellishing the tower as a picturesque eye-catcher in the landscape. Having been well maintained, the form and massing survive intact together with substantial quantities of the original fabric, both to the exterior and to the interior 'greatly improved [1877] by alterations in the internal fittings' (Irish Ecclesiastical Gazette 1st February 1878, 49) where wall monuments and vibrant thirteenth-century French Gothic-style stained glass highlight the artistic potential of a church making a pleasing visual statement in a seaside village street scene.