An Edwardian church in the centre of Isleworth and a landmark at a busy junction. Externally it is a building of mixed materials and is designed in a loose Renaissance style. There is a good, harmonious interior and altar setting. The architect, E. Doran Webb, was responsible for the Birmingham Oratory, begun some four years before this church.

In 1841 the Faithful Companions of Jesus came to Gumley House opposite the present church and set up a boarding school (now a grant-aided day school for girls): the house now provides accommodation for the sisters. The church was started in 1907 and was completed in 1909. A parish hall and presbytery were added by T. H. B. Scott in the 1920s (information from Chris Fanning).

Description

A Renaissance-style building, designed by E. Doran Webb (1864-1931), consisting of a nave and semi-circular apsed sanctuary in one, north and south aisles, narthex and a northwest tower. It has a curious mixture of facing materials externally: limestone for most of the entrance façade at the west end, but red brick for the tower, and pebbledash for most of the side walls (added in the 1980s). The west end is described rather unkindly by Cherry & Pevsner as ‘clumsy’. The front to the nave is of smooth limestone and has a low-pitched roofline. In its upper parts there is a Crucifixion scene with the figures and cross placed upon an uneven band representing the ground. Below is a round-arched doorway with acanthus and volute capitals to the responds. The tower, of two stages, stands to the northwest; it has chamfered corners, various small rectangular windows and single-light, round-arched openings near the top on each face: it carries a low, octagonal capping. The side walls of the church have concave buttresses and clerestory windows with slightly convex heads.

The light, airy interior has three bays to the nave and two to the sanctuary; there is no chancel arch. The two west bays are occupied by a stone west gallery with three arches at ground level and balustraded front above; it houses an organ. The remaining four bays of the nave are occupied by chapels (the two at the northwest, however, have built-in confessionals (architect R. Theodore Beck of Hambledon, Goldalming, date unknown). Between the aisle and nave are circular columns, with capitals similar to those on the western doorway, and behind them are corresponding square piers. The nave and sanctuary are covered by a panelled, barrel-vaulted ceiling, cut into by the clerestory windows. There are no windows at ground level. The sanctuary terminates with a semi-circular, window-less apse.

Fittings:

• The marble altar,  on three steps, has a good baldacchino with four marble columns with  classical columns above which are a moulded cornice and then a  thinly-detailed, pedimented covering.
• An  elegant white marble font with a shallow circular bowl with a metal cover.     
• Other  marble fittings include the altar rails, and, in the southeast chapel, an  altar.

Heritage Details