A modest 1950s church design, built for a post-war housing estate.  It has a pleasing, if conventional interior with some attractive fittings and works of art. The building contributes positively to the street scene. 

The church dedicated to SS Peter and Paul was built to serve the post-war Roseworth estate, developed by Stockton Council for social housing. The church was opened on 19 September, 1956, and was designed to seat around 600 people. The first church planned for this site was larger and designed with a campanile but due to post-war building restrictions the final design was scaled down. The final cost was about £24,000. After the church of the English Martyrs was demolished in 2010, the parishes were combined and some fittings were brought to this church.

Description

The church is orientated with the sanctuary at the southeast end of the building; for this description, conventional liturgical orientation will be used.

The west end faces Redhill Road. The aisled church has gabled transepts containing side chapels, a shallow sanctuary, and narthex below an enclosed gallery at the west end. The building is faced in red stock bricks laid in stretcher bond. The nave roof is covered with red clay pantiles, with coped verges and metal cross finials, with eaves gutters. Aisles have flat roofs behind parapets. The style is a plain interpretation of Romanesque; decoration is restricted to the west entrance which is flanked by attractive mosaic panels made of Venetian coloured and gilded glass, depicted Saint Peter and St Paul, with a mosaic cross above incorporating mosaic symbols of the four evangelists. The double doors are hardwood, the nave clerestory windows are semi-circular headed with clear glass, the aisle windows are rectangular with leaded glazing. The transepts have triple stepped arched windows with clear glass.

Inside, the walls are lined with buff fair-faced brick, articulated by square brick piers and concrete beams to the aisle arcades, and shallow brick pilasters to clerestory level. The flat nave and aisle ceilings are plastered.  The west gallery has been adapted as a weekday chapel, with inserted glazed panels to the front. The concrete stairs retain the 1950s metal balustrade. The nave floor is laid with linoleum tiles with carpet in the aisles.  The sanctuary is behind a proscenium arch, lined with teak.  The panelled dado in the sanctuary is not original.  The reordered sanctuary retains the original marble altar; the floor and steps are carpeted. The nave seating has been remodelled by removing the solid bench ends shown in archive photographs.  The square font has mosaic decoration. Introduced fittings and statuary include carved Gothic angels from Saint Peter and Saint Paul, Tyne Dock.

Heritage Details