Christ Church Congregational Church

The Department's description

Exterior description and setting

A double-height brick Gothic-style Congregational church with concrete dressings, dated 1957, located at the west side of Doagh Road. The church is cruciform in plan, facing north; diminished canted chancel to south flanked by single-storey wings; lean-to linking block to north with single-stage tower to east and single-storey flat-roofed hall to north.

Pitched natural slate roof, moulded concrete coping to brick verges, painted cast-iron downpipes to parapet gutters. Walling is red brick stretcher-bonded over splayed concrete plinth with concrete stringcourse at parapet level; buttresses with concrete off
setting between windows. All concrete is pre-cast. Windows are double-height four-centred-arch leaded-glass with stained glass details in concrete splayed reveals, Geometric-tracery with transoms.

Front (north) gable is abutted by hall. Exposed section has a square-headed tripartite cusped window surmounted by a roundel date plaque.

East elevation is abutted by a full-height transept at left end; exposed section has three windows. Transept has widened window; cheeks are blank.

South gable exposed section is blank. Chancel is abutted to either end by wings; exposed section has three diminished windows with stained glass. Both wings have a tripartite cusped window; one cheek is entirely abutted by transept, the other has single square-headed diagonally sheeted painted timber door.

West elevation is detailed as east elevation.

Linking block and hall are detailed as church but with square-headed cusped windows. Linking block is abutted entirely by hall, left cheek abutted entirely by tower, right cheek has two square-headed cusped windows with buttress to left end and angled buttress to right end.

Tower is detailed as church, angled buttresses to corners, four-centred-arch-headed painted timber diagonally sheeted double-leaf door with wrought-iron strapwork in a rebated concrete surround with collonettes. Right cheek is abutted by hall; exposed section and left cheek are blank.

Hall has one window to centre and two square-headed replacement timber doors to right end; left end is blank and slightly projects. Right cheek has an angled buttresses to left end and one window. Left cheek right end projects and has angled buttresses to ends and one tripartite window; left end abutted by tower.

Setting

The church complex is situated in a tarmac parking lot screened from the road by hedges. There is a detached modern church hall to northwest.

Roof: natural slate roo
Walling: red brick
Windows: leaded-glass
Rainwater Goods: Cast-iron

Historical information

The church is not shown on the sixth edition OS map of 1936-8, however there is a previous building shown on the site. The church is dated 1957 according to the First Survey information and ‘is believed to be one of the last ecclesiastical structures in the area built solely as a church. The tower remained single stage because of a lack of funds’ and its designs appeared in the ‘Belfast Newsletter’ in 1958.

References:

Primary Sources
1. PRONI OS/6/1/57/3 - Third Edition OS map (1902)
2. PRONI OS/6/1/57/6 –Sixth Edition OS Map (revised 1936-8)

Secondary Sources
1. First Survey Information, Belfast Newsletter. 12th May, 1958

Criteria for listing: architectural interest

Not listed

Criteria for listing: historic interest

Not listed

Evaluation

A mid-twentieth-century double-height brick Gothic-styled Congregational church built on a prominent site along the Doagh Road. Constructed in a confident ecclesiastical style but an archaic example of mid-Twentieth century church design and no among the best examples of this era of church building.