A small stone-built chapel built on the site of an ancient chapel, close to a Holy Well. The design is conservative for its date, well-built in the Arts and Crafts manner and sitting harmoniously in its rural setting.  

The present church was apparently built on the site of an ancient chapel beside the Holy Well, in the grounds of Buckland Manor, the home of the Incleden Webber family, who paid for the new building. The foundation stone states that the church was built by Angela Incleden Webber in memory of Sir Pierce Thomas Lacy Bt, at a cost of £5,700. It seated 100 and was solemnly blessed and opened by Bishop Restieaux on 21 June 1958. Braunton was initially a chapel-of-ease to the parish of Barnstaple. In 1962 it was made a separate parish and a presbytery was provided by the benefactors. The church is now served from Ilfracombe.

Description

The church stands in a rural location on the side of a valley and next to the well of St Brannoc, which is a substantial pond. It is in a vaguely Norman style, with small round-headed lancet windows to the nave; the walls are faced with local rubble stone and the roofs covered with Delabole slate.  The plan comprises a small aisleless nave, a west porch with a wide round-arched doorway (and a statue of St Brannoc on the gable), a north transept containing the sacristy which has modern domestic-style windows and a short sanctuary with a semi-circular window high in the east wall. The handsome cross braced timber entrance doors came from another church.

The simple interior has an oak parquet floor, plain plastered walls and a wagon roof in the West Country manner. The oak benches and the wrought-iron altar rail, incorporating a floral design (reused ironwork) are contemporary with the church.

Heritage Details