Saint Mary, Hyson Green

Introduction

Saint Mary, Hyson Green, in the Diocese of Nottingham, opened on 2 February 1910, with the foundation stone laid by Bishop Brindle on 1 July 1909.

History

In 1878 Samuel Limpenny gave a site for a school and chapel in Beaconsfield Street, and a school-chapel was built to designs by Mr Wray. After the Second Vatican Council the sanctuary was reordered under Reynolds & Scott, remodelling the old high altar and providing a new marble sanctuary floor. In 1988 Mary Potter was declared Venerable, and in 1997 her remains were reinterred in Nottingham Cathedral; a circular marble plaque to her is in the south aisle of Saint Mary's. Samuel Henry Langley drew up the plans for Saint Mary's Catholic Church. In 1939 the Lady Chapel was opened as a memorial to Provost John McIlroy, who had been in charge of the mission/parish from 1895 to 1937.

Architecture and furnishings

The west front has a projecting gabled porch with Gothic entrance, a triple light window, and an aedicule with a statue of the Virgin and Child. The tower is asymmetrically placed, octagonal, of Arts and Crafts character, with an open belfry and conical roof and cross. The south front is enclosed by original iron railings on a blue brick plinth, with brick flying buttresses marking the nave bay divisions. The east end has a large carved stone rood panel of the Crucified Christ flanked by Our Lady and St John in the central bay.

The porch leads to a narthex under a western organ gallery fronted by a triple arcade on circular piers, which is glazed in. The nave and aisles are of five bays, with white painted plaster walls, circular piers, and a timber hammerbeam roof with pendants. The altar is of white marble carved with Eucharistic symbols, brought forward for westward celebration, with a multicoloured marble reredos behind. The Lady Chapel, fitted out in 1939, has an oak altar with painted panels of Nazarene character and oak panelled walls.

The aisles and sanctuary have stained glass ranging from 1913 to the 1940s, including sanctuary lancets depicting St Mary and St Joseph and Lady Chapel glass of St Thomas of Canterbury, St Gregory the Great and St Augustine of England. The organ is by Rushworth and Dreaper of Liverpool. There is a series of opus sectile and mosaic Stations of the Cross, likely the work of Earley & Co of Dublin. The church consists of nave and aisles, sanctuary with canted east end, and south Lady Chapel, also canted.

There is an asymmetrically-placed tower on the south side at the west end, and a contemporary presbytery attached to the north side of the chancel, facing onto Belton Street. A pattern of cross keys is set into the brickwork on either side of the triple windows, formed from darker purplish bricks. The stone arcading of the gallery has been glazed in, and above this the gallery front has trefoil arcading. The aisles have lateral arches with solid spandrels marking the bay divisions, and lean-to roofs with exposed rafters.

A tall chancel arch separates the nave from the sanctuary, which also has a version of a hammerbeam roof. There is painted quatrefoil decoration in the window reveals, and the other walls of the sanctuary are lined with Gothic panelling up to head height. The nave seating consists of movable pine benches.