place

Church of Our Lady & St Alphege, Bath

20th-century Roman Catholic church buildings in the United KingdomChurches in Bath, SomersetGiles Gilbert Scott church buildingsGrade II* listed buildings in Bath, SomersetGrade II* listed churches in Somerset
Roman Catholic churches completed in 1929Roman Catholic churches in SomersetUse British English from May 2015
Church of our Lady and St Alphege, Oldfield Park, Bath
Church of our Lady and St Alphege, Oldfield Park, Bath

The Church of Our Lady & St Alphege is a Roman Catholic church located in the Oldfield Park suburb of Bath, Somerset. The church was built between 1927 and 1929 to the designs of Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, the architect of Liverpool Cathedral. The church is modelled on the Early Christian basilica of Santa Maria in Cosmedin, Rome. It is a Grade II* listed building.The exterior is Romanesque, of Bath Stone rubble. A three-arched loggia with Byzantine columns and capitals surrounds it. The red roof tiles were imported from Lombardy. The full-height campanile intended by Scott was not built, due to fears over the strength of the foundations.The interior columns have capitals with figurative carvings by William Drinkwater Gough. Those on the columns on the north side depict scenes from the life of the Virgin Mary, those on the columns on the south, scenes from the life of St Alphege and those supporting the choir and organ loft on the west end show persons associated with the church, including Scott himself.Scott wrote of the church, "It has always been one of my favourite works." Relatively unknown since its construction, the church was overlooked by Sir Nikolaus Pevsner in his 1958 North Somerset and Bristol edition of The Buildings of England. Its importance as an "accomplished composition by (a) nationally-renowned architect" was recognised in 2010 when its listed building status was upgraded to Grade II*. Michael Forsyth in the Pevsner Architectural Guide to Bath describes it as a building that "cannot fail to astonish and delight."

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Church of Our Lady & St Alphege, Bath (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Church of Our Lady & St Alphege, Bath
Oldfield Lane, Bath Oldfield Park

Geographical coordinates (GPS) Address Website Nearby Places
placeShow on map

Wikipedia: Church of Our Lady & St Alphege, BathContinue reading on Wikipedia

Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 51.3734 ° E -2.3763 °
placeShow on map

Address

St Alphege’s Church

Oldfield Lane
BA2 3NR Bath, Oldfield Park
England, United Kingdom
mapOpen on Google Maps

Website
saintalphege.org.uk

linkVisit website

Church of our Lady and St Alphege, Oldfield Park, Bath
Church of our Lady and St Alphege, Oldfield Park, Bath
Share experience

Nearby Places

Westmoreland, Bath

Westmoreland is an area and electoral ward in the south-west of Bath, England. Although still shown on some Ordnance Survey mapping, Westmoreland is rarely used by residents as the name of an area of Bath, and is primarily used for electoral purposes within the Bath and North East Somerset unitary authority, electing two councillors.The name Westmoreland is probably derived from the house, Westmoreland Place (see 1818 and 1852 maps of Bath), that stood approximately where Westmoreland Street is today. Boundary changes for the electoral wards in Bath most recently took place at the May 2019 elections; Westmoreland remained a ward but with altered boundaries. At that election, Westmoreland elected two independents, and was the only ward in the city not to return Liberal Democrats. Confusingly Westmoreland Street, Westmoreland Drive and Westmoreland Road, as well as the former Westmoreland goods station which closed in 1967, are not in the present-day ward, but about half a kilometre away in Oldfield Park ward.Conversely, Oldfield Park railway station and a part of the Oldfield Park residential area, including Moorland Road which is a shopping district, is located in Westmoreland ward. Also in the ward is East Twerton and the one end of the Two Tunnels Greenway.The wards surrounding Westmoreland ward are: Oldfield Park to the east, Moorlands and Southdown to the south, Twerton to the west, and Newbridge and Kingsmead to the north over the River Avon, which forms the ward's northern boundary.Westmoreland has a considerable student population, from the University of Bath and Bath Spa University, both in private rental, and for Bath Spa University students accommodation blocks on former industrial land by the River Avon.

Westmoreland Road goods yard
Westmoreland Road goods yard

Westmoreland Road goods yard was the main Great Western Railway goods station for the city of Bath in England, situated on the main line between the passenger stations of Oldfield Park and Bath (now Bath Spa).It took its name from Westmoreland Road, by which it stood. The official name of the station is uncertain. Railway historian Colin G. Maggs variously used Westmoreland Goods Yard, Westmoreland Road goods yard and Westmoreland Yard goods depot in his book covering this part of the Great Western Railway line. The goods depot was opened in 1877, freeing space at the constrained Bath Spa station site. A small engine shed was also moved from Bath Spa to Westmoreland in 1880. The goods depot was located on the up side of the line, fronting onto the Lower Bristol Road, opposite the Newark Works of crane makers Stothert & Pitt. Further west on the down side towards Oldfield Park railway station, on the other side of Westmoreland Road, was located a goods loop and four sidings, called Bath West.One notable event was the unloading in 1903 of the special train for Buffalo Bill & His Wild West Show. A more frequent event putting heavy demands on the depot was whenever the Bath and West Show was held in Bath, and horse arrivals for the Bath Racecourse. In April 1942 German bombing caused major damage to the goods depot.Until 1911 the yard was controlled by two signal boxes, Westmoreland East and Westmoreland West. In 1911 these were replaced by a single signal box called Bath Goods.The Bath engine shed at Westmoreland closed in February 1961. The goods depot closed in May 1967, but the sidings remained open for full loads until 31 December 1980. In the 1980s the goods depot was redeveloped into an office development called The Square, with the former goods shed converted into one of the office buildings.The down side sidings (Bath West) were developed as a refuse transfer terminal, called Westmoreland Railhead, by Avon County Council in the mid-1980s, taking waste to a landfill site in Calvert, Buckinghamshire. The refuse transfer terminal remained in operation until 2011 when a new mechanical biological waste treatment plant opened in Avonmouth.A passageway at the western end of Westmoreland Station Road still gives pedestrian access under the railway to Westmoreland Street; in 2018 a review of the Widcombe public rights of way recommended that it be classified as such.