250

 

II*  

Designated  

04/10/1973  

10/06/1997  

Church of St Mary, with churchyard walls  

 

Conwy  

Kinmel Bay and Towyn  

Kinmel Bay and Towyn  

Towyn  

297342  

379428  

NW  

The church lies immediately E of the Sandbank Road crossroads at the centre of Towyn, enclosed by a rectangular churchyard.  

Religious, Ritual and Funerary  

 

The church was built in 1872-3 to the design of George Edmund Street for Robert Bamford Hesketh of Gwrych Castle, as part of a group with the Vicarage and Church School, to serve the newly formed parish of Towyn. The contractor was J Rhydwen Jones of Rhyl, and the total cost, including the Vicarage, was £8,000. The church seated 250 people. G E Street, like Butterfield, designed a number of such groups for new settlements or wealthy individuals; the Towyn group is clearly second only to Boyne Hill, Maidenhead, for the quality of both its architecture and the grouping, and being the last of his career, may be said to have profited from over 20 years of professional experience.  

Early Decorated style, built of polygonal pick-dressed local Carboniferous limestone, with Bath oolite dressings and blue and green slate roof laid in a lozenge pattern. Tall nave with aisle on N side only, a crossing tower over the chancel bay, and a short E sanctuary. Main entrance porch on the S, and vestry at right angles on the N side, linking to the Vicarage. The S porch has a moulded outer open arch with triple filleted respond shafts and ring caps continued as a wall string. The inner door is moulded with varied leaf motifs enriching a hollow moulding. Hood moulding and nook shafts. Oak door with elaborate iron hinges. Seats each side and tiled floor. Three 2-light windows set high in the nave walls, above a wall string, with varied heads. No hood mouldings. West window of 3 lights. The tower is of 3 stages, a tall lower stage with a large traceried window to the S, a small 2-light window to the upper chamber, and large 2-light louvred openings to the bell chamber on E and W sides. Saddleback roof between raised gables, springing from an ashlar trefoiled corbel table and parapet on N and S. On the NE corner, a circular stair to the upper chamber has a conical top. A 3-light window with sexfoil head at the E end. All roofs have blue and green slates laid to a lozenge pattern. The vestry is of 2 bays; 3-light windows with square heads, and low roof over pentice to the Vicarage. The churchyard is enclosed by low limestone walls with flush half-round copings, extending across the front of the former school.  

Nave and aisle are separated by an arcade of 4 bays. Open waggon roof of pitch pine with 5 crown post trusses. Walls are of exposed stonework. Aisle and clerestory windows have an inner stone screen with shafts. Choir, under the tower, is raised by 2 steps; quadripartite rectangular vault with a central circular opening for hoisting bells. Three further steps to the sanctuary, which has a 3-bay sedilia under a continuous hood mould extending E over the piscina. Figured reredos of the Crucifixion by Earp, now painted, and to either side, later painted and gilded metal panels of saints set within a wall arcade. The church retains a fine set of furnishings and fittings designed by Street. Three bay oak screen to the chancel, and oak choir stalls. Brass pole communion rail on iron stanchions by Earp and Lever. Encaustic pavings to chancel by Godwin of Lugwardine, those of the nave replaced after the incursion by the sea in 1990. Pulpit is circular, of limestone, raised on a step and with arcaded sides. Lectern of brass. The font, by the S door, is of limestone, octagonal with diapered sides, raised on a step. The organ is set on the N side, with the vestry to the rear. Glass: E window by Hardman; Christ with saints and martyrs in Heaven, to the design of G E Street. Monuments: Two marble war memorial tablets on the S nave wall. Brass in chancel to Winifred, Countess of Dundonald, of Gwrych, d.1924. Miscellaneous: A large oil painting of Christ blessing the children, the artist unknown, and a smaller painting after Veronese.  

Listed Grade II* as an important design and the key element in the outstanding group of contemporary buildings designed by a pre-eminent Victorian church architect.