Survey Data
Reg No
31306502
Rating
Regional
Categories of Special Interest
Architectural, Artistic, Historical, Social, Technical
Original Use
Church/chapel
In Use As
Church/chapel
Date
1955 - 1960
Coordinates
73634, 293866
Date Recorded
24/11/2010
Date Updated
--/--/--
Description
Detached eight-bay double-height Catholic church, built 1957, on a rectangular plan comprising seven-bay double-height nave opening into single-bay double-height apse (east) on a half-octagonal plan with single-bay single-storey flat-roofed projecting porch to entrance (west) front. Pitched slate roof with half-octagonal slate roof to apse (east), clay ridge tiles, concrete coping to gables with Cross finials to apexes, and replacement uPVC rainwater goods on concrete box eaves. Roughcast walls on rendered plinth with roughcast "buttress" piers. Round-headed window openings with concrete sills, and rendered "bas-relief" surrounds framing fixed-pane fittings having stained glass margins centred on square glazing bars. Round-headed window openings to apse (east) with concrete sills, and rendered "bas-relief" surrounds framing fixed-pane fittings having stained glass margins centred on leaded stained glass panels. Round-headed window opening to entrance (west) front in triangular-headed recess with concrete sill, and rendered "bas-relief" surround framing fixed-pane fitting having stained glass margins centred on square glazing bars. Round-headed window opening (porch) with concrete sill, and rendered "bas-relief" surround framing storm glazing over fixed-pane fitting having leaded stained glass panel. Interior including vestibule (west) with dragged cut-limestone font on a circular plan below stained glass memorial window (1924; installed 1957); square-headed door opening into nave with glazed timber panelled double doors having overlight; full-height interior open into roof with central aisle between cruciform-detailed timber pews, paired stations between frosted glass memorial windows (undated), exposed collared steel roof construction with wind braced rafters to ceiling; and round-headed chancel arch framing herring bone-pattern timber parquet stepped dais to sanctuary (east) with cut-veined Connemara marble stepped "predella" supporting inlaid cut-veined Connemara marble altar between stained glass memorial windows (----). Set in landscaped grounds with rendered piers to perimeter having concrete capping supporting replacement mild steel double gates.
Appraisal
A church representing an integral component of the twentieth-century ecclesiastical heritage of Contae Mhaigh Eo [County Mayo] with the architectural value of the composition suggested by such attributes as the rectilinear plan form, aligned along a liturgically-correct axis; and the slender profile of the openings underpinning a streamlined Romanesque theme. Having been well maintained, the elementary form and massing survive intact together with substantial quantities of the original fabric, both to the exterior and to the interior where the Weddall Window produced (1924) by Ethel Rhind (1878-1952) and Michael Healy (1873-1941) of An Túr Gloine (opened 1903), Dublin, to a design by Wilhelmina Geddes (1887-1955) highlights the artistic potential of the composition: meanwhile, an exposed roof construction pinpoints the engineering or technical dexterity of a church making a pleasing visual statement in a somewhat bleak setting.