The Holy Ghost and St Stephen

Introduction

The church of the Holy Ghost and St Stephen in Shepherds Bush, London, was designed by architect-priest Father (later Canon) Alexander Joseph Cory Scoles and built in 1903-4 in an Early English revival style, with the attached presbytery also by Scoles. The church is listed at Grade II.

History

In June 1889 Father Arthur Pownall opened a room at 33 Askew Crescent as a first chapel. The foundation stone was laid on 29 March 1903. The incomplete church was opened on 5 April 1904. The overall cost was £6,000: the contractor was John McManus of Hammersmith and the altar was installed by AB Wall of Cheltenham. Reordering took place, it is thought, in the 1970s but was sympathetically done, with the pulpit and alabaster high altar retained, and with the communion rail reused at the east end of the sanctuary.

Architecture and furnishings

The plan is longitudinal, comprising a six-bay nave with aisles and clerestory, accessed via a narthex to the western bay with the organ loft over. The two-bay, square-plan sanctuary to the east is flanked by a Lady Chapel to the north and a Sacred Heart Chapel to the south. A stained glass window in the Lady Chapel by Veronica Whall, 1948, depicts the Virgin. The east window in the sanctuary (1906) and the west window of the north aisle (1905) are good, conventional work by E Stanley Watkins of Ealing.

The baptistery remains intact at the west end of the north aisle; it contains a richly carved alabaster font on a base of clustered shafts, and a statue of St John the Baptist. There are also painted and gilded saints in the arcade which more closely resemble the style of N H J Westlake (from the left, St John Fisher, St Thomas More, Our Lady, St Joseph, St Mildred and St Edward the Confessor). Fixtures and fittings include a memorial pulpit of travertine, divided into panels with painted relief figures depicting English Martyrs.

The floor of the Lady Chapel is richly treated in marble panels. There are shrines to St Anthony, St Theresa and St Joseph (north aisle), and St Patrick and St Stephen (south aisle). A modern mosaic of the head of Christ is at the west end of the south aisle. At the west end of the north aisle is a roundel mosaic depicting St Peter.

The Stations of the Cross are conventional carved timber. Canon A J C Scoles designed the church in 1903 in a stylised version of the Early English style. The main roof and side aisles are covered in red tiles. Secondary elevations are of buff London stock brick.

The façade is largely symmetrical and triple-gabled. A circular window in the east wall contains four quatrefoils. Three doorways at the west end have tympana depicting the Annunciation, Our Lady seated before an adoring host, and the martyrdom of St Stephen. Internally, the church is plastered and painted a very pale yellow.

The nave has octagonal piers with double-chamfered arches. The nave roof is five-sided and divided into square panels by simple ribs, the sanctuary roof is keeled and painted with stars, and the aisle roofs are four-sided. An original chimneypiece remains intact to the main reception room, comprising a lugged moulded surround beneath a pulvinated frieze and mantel shelf, with the opening boarded over. The sanctuary wall paintings include scenes of the Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes on the north and the Last Supper on the south.

The murals are crowned by an angelic host surrounding the monstrance throne, and in the apex of the wall is the Dove of the Holy Spirit descending. Marble is used extensively in the Lady Chapel, sanctuary and shrine of the Sacred Heart at the east end of the south aisle. The west bay of the nave is occupied by a glazed-in narthex with a repository on the south side and a gallery over. The altar has columns and is made up of various marbles.

Parish life

Children make their First Holy Communion at Holy Ghost & Saint Stephen on a Saturday, normally in May. The parish has a Finance Committee assisting the parish priest with finances and property.