10712

 

II*  

Designated  

18/07/1990  

19/09/1997  

Church of St Peter  

 

Ceredigion  

Ceulanamaesmawr  

Aberystwyth  

Bontgoch/Elerch  

268412  

286457  

 

Situated in village on S side of lane running ENE from main valley road, about 150m E of junction.  

Religious, Ritual and Funerary  

 

Anglican parish church, built to serve Elerch township in Llanbadarn Fawr parish, 1865-8. Designed by William Butterfield for the Rev. Lewis Gilbertson, Vice-principal of Jesus College, Oxford, whose family lived at Cefn Gwyn, Elerch.  

Coursed rubble stone with sandstone dressings, rubble stone since rendered over on S,W and E walls. Slate roofs with crested ridge tiles. Complex and carefully-handled High Victorian design, a play of solid geometry building-up pitched roofs from the lowest vestry to the crowning tower pyramid. Nave and chancel with crossing tower, shallow S transept, large N porch, N transeptal stair-tower linked to NE vestry. Nave has tallest roof, S transept slightly lower, chancel lower again, then N stair tower hipped roof slips below tower sill course. A further gradation takes the eye from this hipped roof down to the hipped porch roof to the far right. Particularly fine is the NE sequence, the hipped stair-tower having a very tall wall-face chimney corbelled out from an otherwise flush wall that runs E with the roofs graded down from hip to lean-to (over the tower door) to lower lean-to over the vestry. This last returns the movement upward by being continuous with the chancel roof. Ashlar flush windows, sandstone quoins and corbels. Tower is rectangular, not square, with corbelled eaves and slate pyramid roof. Small shouldered-headed bell-lights with sill-course. Nave has W 2 cusped lancets and quatrefoil. Sills linked over mid-buttress. NW porch has corbelled eaves, hipped roof, double-chamfered arch with impost string course and side buttressing. String course on porch E and nave N under single 2-light and pair of 2-light windows. One buttress. S side is similar. Paired 2-lights each have a quatrefoil above. S transept has high 2-light with quatrefoil but also hoodmould. Chancel is windowless S, has stepped E triplet, and 2 buttresses below sill course. N vestry has sill course, E rectangular light, and N small traceried ashlar roundel. To right, stair tower shouldered N door with triangular hood and small single light under first floor corbelled stack with small stair light to left.  

Plastered walls, scissor-rafter roofs. Broad chamfered W and E tower arches, dying into walls. S transept has higher arch, cleverly lighting crossing. Chancel has S pointed and cusped sedilia recess and small trefoiled shelf recess to left. N side vestry door. Furnishings: exemplary range of Butterfield's very simple but innovative Gothic woodwork, including open-back pews, canted-fronted pulpit with pierced panels, stalls with cusped pierced frontals, similar priest's stall, cusped pierced sanctuary rails, panelled pierced altar and small bench in sedilia recess. Exceptionally fine marble font: massive grey marble square bowl to subtle tapered form, on ashlar pier with red marble inset angle shafts, black marble square base and raised on an ashlar step. Also fine and characteristic of Butterfield are the graded stepped floors of the chancel with increasingly rich use of coloured and encaustic tiles subtly set in stone borders. Encaustic tiles are inset in ashlar reredos which has stepped top, and simple but careful tile patterning, the centrepiece a cross set on plain stone, the sides more heavily tile-inlaid. E window to the sisters of the Rev. Gilbertson is an exceptional work of Alexander Gibbs, Crucified Christ flanked by soldiers over three small story panels. Strong Gothic drawing style with clear lines and bold colours. Chancel N consecration memorial 1868. N door leads to passage with boiler-house cum stair-tower left and vestry right. Iron ladder to bell-stage with 4 bells. Weathercock stored in boilerhouse.  

Exceptional example of a small rural church by one of the leading High Victorian architects.