A simple early twentieth-century structure, built as an Anglican church hall and converted to use as a Catholic church in 1963. 

Hendon railway station opened in 1868 but development of the area was initially slow and by 1886 there were only 200 houses in the area. Development accelerated considerably in the 1890s. The present St Patrick’s church was originally known as St John’s Church Hall and was presumably associated with the Church of England church of St John, West Hendon in Algernon Road, which had been designed by Temple Moore and consecrated in 1896. A block plan of the hall preserved in the Diocesan Property Services archives is marked ‘proposed church hall’ and has the date 1913 and the signature of John Hudson LRIBAof 2 York Place, Baker Street. The hall was acquired by the Diocese of Westminster in 1962 as a chapel of ease to Hendon parish and was first registered for Catholic worship in 1964. The church was reordered by Austin Winkley in 1983 and again by D. W. Aitken in the late 1980s (information from Chris Fanning).

Description

The building is rectangular on plan with an overall pitched roof covered with natural slate.  The gabled main front of the church is faced with red brick laid in Flemish bond and has a central entrance between lower forebuildings with hipped roofs.  Above the entrance is a large segment-headed window with a cross in modern timber glazing. The other elevations are covered with painted pebbledash, with modern rectangular windows in the side walls and wide dormers in the roof. The roof is hipped at the (liturgical) east end, and this part of the building is of two storeys and in residential use. The interior of the church is a single space lit by large rectangular windows and dormers and spanned by the arched trusses of the roof.  A sanctuary has been formed in the (liturgical) eastern bay. There are no furnishings of particular note.

Heritage Details