Saint Patrick, Leicester

Introduction

Saint Patrick's Church in Leicester is a substantial 1950s brick church in the Romanesque manner, built by Reynolds & Scott.

History

The mahogany benches of the nave are original to the church. A stained glass window depicting St Patrick stands at the back of the church.

The first St Patrick's church in Leicester was built by the Dominicans in 1854 to designs by Joseph Hansom. St Patrick's was made a separate mission in 1873.

The mission was handed over to the Diocese of Nottingham in 1894. St Patrick's closed in 1940 and the parish merged with Our Lady in Moira Street. The new church was built in 1958-9 from designs by Reynolds & Scott, with builders G. Duxbury & Sons. The parish hall was built in 1964 and the presbytery in 1972.

The church was reordered in 1980 by John Rochford & Partners. The 1980 reordering removed the original stone altar, pulpit and communion rail; some stone was reused in a new altar and the font was moved.

During 1982 and 1983, the Saint Patrick's Chapel was completed with a statue of carved wood and a parish banner. In 1949, on the appointment of a priest as Parish Priest of Our Lady and Saint Patrick's, a Mass Centre had been set up in the grandstand of the Leicester Stadium and land was acquired in Beaumont Leys Lane for a church, presbytery and parish.

Architecture and furnishings

The church is built in modern Romanesque style with buff-coloured brick walls and a slate roof. The plan comprises an aisled nave with pitched roof, a tall southwestern tower, short transepts and a small sanctuary with an eastern apse. Internally the nave is formed of three square bays, each covered by a flat saucer dome. The aisles are separated from the nave by a triple arch arcade in each bay supported on columns of artificial stone.

The high transepts and sanctuary have barrel-vaulted ceilings. The triple-domed interior is similar to their church at Wembley, Middlesex. The shallow-gabled west front has a central entrance door and tall rounded-headed window above, set slightly forward of the west tower. The tower has pairs of small windows on each face, twin belfry openings in the ringing stage and a pyramidal roof.

The flat-roofed side aisles and the tall nave wall behind are articulated by two shallow projections with three small windows in the aisle and a single large round-headed window in the nave clerestorey. The transepts do not project beyond the line of the aisles and have shallow gables like the west front. The south transept fronting the road has an entrance door with window above like the western entrance. The sanctuary is lower than the nave with a pitched roof and a pair of round-headed windows in each side.

The apsidal east end has similar windows. The nave is lit by large semi-circular windows set high in the wall. At the west end is a choir gallery with an enclosed narthex below.

Parish life

The parish serves St Patrick’s Catholic Voluntary Academy and English Martyrs Catholic School. A Parish Pastoral Council enables the parish’s teams and groups to collaborate in ministry, social events, and mutual support.