From 1824 Mass was celebrated in Wrexham by the Rev. John Briggs of Chester. The Catholic community met in a house in Market Street and later in Cutler’s Entry. In 1828 a chapel was built in King Street at the expense of Richard Thompson, a member of an English family of ironmasters who had moved from Wigan to help develop the coal and iron industries. When the congregation became too large for the chapel, Thompson provided funds for the building of the present church, endowing it with an annual sum of £100 and gifting a further £100 for a set of Stations of the Cross. E. W. Pugin was appointed as architect for the church and presbytery in 1857 at the age of 23, making it one of his earliest commissions.

In 1898 the Diocese of Menevia was created by Pope Leo XIII, with Wrexham as the episcopal seat, and Our Lady of Sorrows was consecrated by Bishop Francis Mostyn as pro-cathedral on 7 March 1907. In 1957 a northwest porch and sacristies were added and the sanctuary reordered by the architect Frederick Roberts of Mold. Further alterations and additions including the ‘north cloister’ followed in 1966 (drawings for this by Roberts, under the umbrella of the Anthony Clark Partnership, are in the diocesan archives). Since 1987 the building has been the cathedral church of the Diocese of Wrexham. 

The cathedral houses the shrine of St Richard Gwynn, who was executed for his faith on 15 October 1584 and is one of Forty Martyrs of England and Wales canonised by Pope Paul VI in 1970. An annual celebration and pilgrimage are held at the church on the Sunday closest to his death. 

Description

See list entry, below; this does not set out clearly the sequence of alterations and additions.

As originally built, E. W. Pugin’s church consisted of a nave with side aisles, southwest tower, sanctuary, Lady Chapel and sacristy. It is in the late thirteenth century early decorated style, as favoured by his father, A. W. N. Pugin, and built of coursed ashlar stone quarried at Minera, with slate roofs. The tower has a broach spire with lucarnes and projecting band courses. The clerestory to the four-bay nave consists of a row of rose windows, and the large east and west windows are impressive in their scale and tracery design. At the west end is an organ gallery.

In 1957 the northwest porch and the sacristies were added by Frederick Roberts of Mold. He also reordered the sanctuary to incorporate the cathedra and canons’ stalls and moved the former high altar to its present position in what became the Blessed Sacrament Chapel, adding a new altar. The former sacristy became the Lady Chapel, and Roberts removed the wall between the sanctuary and the new Lady Chapel, replacing it with the existing ironwork screen. Nine years later the Blessed Sacrament Chapel was extended to the north and east, and the window that had been behind the altar was removed and set in the new north wall. The resulting recess between the porch and the extended chapel was enclosed and is known as the north cloister. The sacristies were also extended by a link corridor to the north chapel. The area suffers from mining subsidence, and the spire has been rebuilt twice, once in the early twentieth century, and again in 2007.

The present high altar dates from 1959 and contains relics of St Sixtus and St Lucy. This, the cathedra and the choir stalls were all designed by Roberts. Pugin’s decorative scheme for the sanctuary has been almost completely obliterated; the ceiling was similar to his surviving work at Shrewsbury Cathedral, but four painted and gilded panels of angels playing musical instruments over the sanctuary arch are all that survives. On the north wall of the sanctuary is the original aumbry, and on the south the piscina. The carved stone ambo, designed by Peter Paul Pugin, was recovered from the church of Our Lady and St Edmund in Great Malvern in 2007 by the present Dean. The east window was donated by Lady Ffrench, daughter of Richard and Ellen Thompson, in memory of her husband, Thomas, the fourth baronet who died in 1892. The central roundel is a pieta, around which are images of Welsh saints, apostles and archangels. The Pugin font has been relocated to the east end of the south aisle with its original setting of Victorian encaustic tiles.  

The stained glass in the nave windows is late nineteenth century by Hardman & Co; each window is in memory of a prominent member or benefactor of the church. Those which were originally where the porch and Blessed Sacrament extensions intervened have been relocated. The Stations of the Cross, which are painted on linen laid on copper, date from 1906. They were originally framed, but were reinstalled as part of the 1957 reordering, and set into the wall surface. In the cloister is the tomb chest of Ellen Thompson, wife of Richard, who died of cholera in 1854. It incorporates a fine effigy of the deceased in medieval dress. This originally stood at the west end of the north aisle but was moved when the porch was built. In the cloister too are the arms of the Bishops of Menevia from 1898-1987.

List descriptions

Cathedral

Reference Number: 1801
Grade: II  
Date of Designation: 31/01/1994  
Name of Property: Roman Catholic Cathedral of St Mary  
Unitary Authority: Wrexham  
Community: Offa  
Easting: 333156  
Northing: 350468  
Street Side: S  
Location: Opposite the junction with Grosvenor Road.  

History: Built in 1857 at the expense of Richard Thompson, iron master and colliery owner, to designs of E. W. Pugin. Designated the Pro-Cathedral of the diocese of Menevia in 1907.  

Exterior: Coursed and squared stone with slate roofs. Tower and spire to (liturgical) SW, nave with 2 lean-to aisles, clerestory and lower chancel. Additional aisle and side chapel to north. Late C13 style. West doorway in steep archway with shafts and hood mould, flanked by steep pinnacled niches. 5-light window above. 2-light windows in west walls of aisles, which are divided into 4 bays by buttresses, with 2-light geometrical traceried windows beneath angled hood moulds. Rose windows as clerestory lights. SW tower and spire, with steep trefoiled window in base of tower, lancet in upper stage, and paired bell-chamber lights. Brooch spire with lucarnes and projecting bands. Massive trefoiled east window in chancel, comprising rose window with a band of quatrefoil lights below.  

Interior: Early English arcade of 4 bays, clustered shafts with fillets, and hood moulds which form trefoils between each arch. Gallery in western bay, carried on chamfered timber piers. Splayed clerestory lights, and stilted arches to aisle windows. Wagon roof with wall posts on corbels to principal trusses. Clustered shafts to deep moulded chancel arch. Painted figures of angles on gilded ground set in shallow panels over chancel arch. Paired narrow arches to Lady Chapel to north. Full-height eastern arch, containing window. Stained glass in aisle windows form a series of memorial windows, none are signed or dated, but their style is reminiscent of that of Kempe and Tower, and they are probably late C19-early C20. NW window possibly earlier, a neo-medieval style incorporating a mosaic of fragments. Memorial to Ellan Thompson, (d. 1854), in side chapel of outer north aisle: recumbent effigy on an arched panelled tomb-chest with low-reliefs.  

Reason for designation: Group value.  

Presbytery

Reference Number: 1803
Grade: II  
Date of Designation: 31/01/1994  
Name of Property: Presbytery at Roman Catholic Cathedral  
Unitary Authority: Wrexham  
Community: Offa  
Easting: 333135  
Northing: 350472  
Location: Adjoins the R.C. Cathedral, to which it is linked by a stone covered way.  

History: Built as the presbytery to the Roman Catholic Church of Saint Mary (now the cathedral) in 1857, to designs of E. W. Pugin, and extended later in C19 with additions to rear wing.  

Exterior: Brick with stone dressings and slate roof. Gothic style, 2 storeys, 4 window range with advanced outer gables and doorway in angle of central range with right hand gable. Arched doorway in chamfered stone architrave beneath lean-to porch carried on chamfered and braced struts, continuing between the two gables. Plain narrow lights to ground floor of left hand wing, the upper windows paired foiled lancets. Similar paired windows in entrance range. Canted bay window with transomed lancet lights in right hand gable, and triple foiled lancets above. Upper windows throughout have pale brick relieving arches over. Both gables surmounted by cross finials. Axial and gable end stacks. Return elevation to right has paired foiled lancets on each floor, the upper windows beneath a gabled dormer, and wide advanced gable beyond, with canted bay window to ground floor, and paired lancets beneath relieving arch above. Later extension beyond this gable, in a similar style, with single lancet window and squared bay window set across the angle.  

Interior: The central range of the frontage is entirely occupied by the full-height stair hall, with heavy chamfered wood staircase and balustrade of galleried upper landing. Original layout and some detail including joinery and encaustic tiled floor to entrance hall survive.  

Reason for designation: The presbytery forms an integral part of the designs for the cathedral site, and is a good example of the domestic gothic style typically used for buildings with an ecclesiastical function. Group value with Roman Catholic Cathedral.  

Boundary wall and gates to cathedral

Reference Number: 1802
Grade: II  
Date of Designation: 31/01/1994  
Name of Property: Boundary Wall and Gates to Roman Catholic Cathedral  
Unitary Authority: Wrexham  
Community: Offa  
Easting: 333167  
Northing: 350496  
Location: Forms the boundary of the church yard with Regent Street to the north of the cathedral, the gates aligned with the main west door.  

History: Probably designed as part of the original plans for the church site, and therefore probably to designs of E. W. Pugin in 1857.  

Exterior: Coursed and squared rubble wall, with steep raking copings, and gate piers with gabletted copings, to which cast iron lamp standards are attached by iron brackets.  

Reason for designation: A rare survivor of Victorian gothic street furniture, forming an important element in the cathedral site. Group value with Roman Catholic Cathedral.  

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The first Catholic presence in Aberdyfi came just before the outset of the First World War, when the Jesuits hired the Aberdovey Hotel during the summer months as a holiday residence for their novices. In the years after the war a small community of Catholics developed as workers moved into the town. By 1931 the community was substantial enough for a priest to travel from Aberystwyth to say a regular Mass in a dance hall over the Market Hall. In 1937 Colonel Ruck and his wife (who was Catholic) provided a room at their home ‘Bryndeno’ for use as a Mass centre; the house was at the top of Vicarage Hill.

In 1939 the Rev. Basil Rowlands moved to Aberdyfi from Machynlleth for three months, staying at ‘Hendrie’, the home of Mr and Mrs Charles Wright. Originally from Wolverhampton, the Wrights were both Catholics and in the early 1940 gave their tin hut garage for use as a Mass centre. The hut had been in use at Park Hall Camp, Oswestry, a military training camp, during the First World War. It had a pitched roof, with cardboard lined walls and ceiling and held approximately forty people. The site had formerly been used as a paddock and was surrounded by a small wood, which became known as ‘Catholic Wood’. Griffith Evans, a local builder, transformed the hut into a chapel, including construction of the altar, communion rails and sacristy furnishings.

During the 1960s the Rev. Charles Lloyd was appointed priest at Aberdyfi, and he endeavoured to improve the tin chapel. With the help of locally-based soldiers he cleared some of the trees from the site and in 1965 the chapel was renovated and extended. A single transept was added, making it L-shaped and increasing the capacity to about one hundred. 

By 1972 it was evident the building was no longer fit for purpose and the community set about fundraising for a new church, for which plans were prepared by the Liverpool firm of Weightman & Bullen (who had earlier produced the designs for St David, Tywyn, for Fr Lloyd, qv). In 1974 the old tin chapel was demolished and building of the new church began on the same site. The church of Christ the King opened at Easter 1975 and was consecrated later that year, on the Feast of Christ the King.

In 2015 regular Sunday Mass ceased after the retirement of the parish priest, and in August 2016 the church was closed as a result of diocesan pastoral review. At the time of visiting (June 2018) the future of the building was uncertain.

Description

The church was constructed in 1974-75 to the design of Weightman & Bullen, architects of numerous churches in the diocese between the 1950s and 1970s. Modern in design, the building is a steel frame construction with concrete block walls and pilasters faced externally with random courses of artificial stone. The roof is largely flat with a cross-gabled semi-glazed roof over the nave and sanctuary. The windows are metal framed with clear glass. 

The interior consists of a wide entrance space, hall and nave with adjacent confessional, sacristy and WC.  Designed as a multipurpose space, the nave, hall and entrance were separated by sliding partitions, to allow for larger congregations during the summer months. The nave though square on plan had seating arranged in a fan shape towards the corner sanctuary. The flooring throughout is grey vinyl, the walls painted white, and the steel roof beams clad with timber. One partition is painted timber and glazed while the other is aluminium and vinyl. The holy water stoup is of carved, black polished slate; the altar has a black polished slate mensa on a rectangular, hammer dressed granite block matching the font, which has a slanted rim with a carved inscription ‘Baptizari in nomine Domini et Ivssit Eos’. A wall-mounted Carrara marble statue of Our Lady with the Holy Infant is by John Skelton, nephew and apprentice of Eric Gill.

Text amended by AHP 4.12.2025

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A temporary mission was established in Abergele in 1847 for the benefit of Irish labourers, 300 of whom were engaged in building the railway at that time. However, it was not until 1934 that a church was built, when Giuseppe Rinvolucri, an Italian engineer and architect who resided in Glan Conwy, was commissioned by Canon J. E. Quinn. It was one of three remarkable reinforced concrete churches that he built in North Wales in the 1930s, and the first church in the Diocese of Menevia to be dedicated to St Therese of Lisieux. The contractor was G. P. Gregory and Son of Caernarvon and the cost was below £4,000. The building was opened in September 1934. In 1971 the sanctuary was reordered by Bowen Dann Davies.

Description

The church has a cruciform plan recalling the Celtic cross with semi-circular apses at the ends of the four arms. At the centre is a dome with semi-domes over the apses and a barrel vault over the nave. It is constructed of reinforced concrete and faced externally in rock-faced limestone rubble, reputedly to fit in with neighbouring buildings. The roofs appear to be covered in mineral felt, although the list description says copper. The style is Byzantine, with round headed windows set high in the walls and an arcaded porch at the west end supported on marble columns.

The interior is tall and simple in character with plain plaster walls painted in cream and pale blue. Niches in the splayed walls of the domed space contain wooden statues of Our Lady, St Joseph, St Winefride and St Anthony. At the west end is a gallery formerly used by the choir, but later extended to create a narthex with steel trusses supporting a timber floor and a timber and glass screen at ground floor level. It is reached by a spiral staircase, but is no longer used. The sanctuary floor is paved in grey marble, and the floors of the baptistery and the chapel of St Therese are of grey slate. The main floor is timber, but has been carpeted. In 1971 the sanctuary was reordered by Bowen Dann Davies, which involved the installation of a new timber-faced altar and tabernacle designed by Victor Neep (1921-79), Welsh painter and sculptor. These are described by Edward Hubbard in The Buildings of Wales as ‘ferocious’, and the font, also by Neep, he called ‘peculiar’.    

List description

Reference Number: 18664
Grade: II  
Date of Designation: 05/08/1997  
Date of Amendment: 05/08/1997  
Name of Property: Church of St Teresa of Lisieux  
Unitary Authority: Conwy  
Community: Abergele  
Town: Abergele  
Locality: Abergele  
Easting: 294615  
Northing: 377896  
Street Side: E  

Location: Located N of the town centre, on the corner of Clwyd Avenue.  

History: Built in 1934 to the design of G Rinvolucri, an Italian immigrant architect living in Conwy, who later built a church in similar style in Ludlow. Altered in 1971 by Bowen, Dann, Davies, when the tabernacle and font by Victor Neep were installed.  

Exterior: Built of limestone, with copper sheet roof cladding. Cruciform plan, all arms terminating in semi-circular apses. The entrance arm is extended, and has a triple semi-circular arched arcade on a raised podium with marble columns and Byzantine style capitals. Apses and the entrance arm have triplets of round-headed small windows set high in the walls, and above, the parapet is outset on a corbel table. Central dome with apex cross, and barrel vaults to the arms, semi-domes over the apses.  

Interior: The interior is simple; plastered walls and high unmoulded arched openings to the wings, and smaller arches to the apses. The splays of the main piers supporting the dome have simple niches. The eastern apse is raised, with a priest’s door to the left, and marble pavings. The baptistery in the E apse has radially set grey slate pavings and a boldly designed font of 1971 by Victor Neep. The Chapel of St Teresa in the W apse has an octagonal slate floor. The entrance arm is ceiled, above which is the choir gallery.  

Reason for designation: Included for its special interest as a prominently sited and distinctively Byzantine style inter-war church.  

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In 1885 the Rev. Henry Hughes, a Catholic convert originally from Caernarfon, was granted permission by Bishop Edmund Knight of Shrewsbury to build a monastery of the Third Order of St Dominic (of which he was a member) on the site of the ancient monastery of St Tudwal, on St Tudwal’s Island off the coast at Abersoch. Bishop Knight’s hope was that the monastery would become a ‘centre for Missions to the Welsh of North Wales’. A small community was formed, living in two cottages in Abersoch until a jetty was built on the island. On Rosary Sunday 1886 Mass was said in one of the cottages, the first in Abersoch since the Reformation. Soon after, the community settled on the island where they converted a dry-stone building into a chapel. Fr Hughes would travel from the island to Abersoch and Pwllheli each week to preach, however, in the winter of 1887 he fell ill and died suddenly and the monastery plan was abandoned. Thereafter Catholics living around Abersoch would travel to Pwllheli for Mass, some twenty miles away.

After the Second World War Abersoch developed as a resort, with the small resident Catholic community supplemented in the summer months by holidaymakers. In the early 1950s plans to establish a chapel-of-ease were initiated by Fr Cunningham, parish priest of Pwllheli, who had previously built churches at Porthmadog and Pwllheli (qqv). The land was given by the Misses Isambard-Owen, daughters of Sir Herbert Isambard Owen (one of the principle figures in the founding of the University of Wales), and granddaughters of the Chief Engineer of the Great Western Railway and associate of Isambard Kingdom Brunel, hence the ‘Isambard’ (information from Sue Copp, Wrexham Archives, pers. comm.).  The foundation stone was laid on 3 August 1953 by Bishop John Petit of Menevia. In January 1954, with the church only half-built and further funding still required, Fr Cunningham died and construction work stalled. It resumed in 1955 and was finished later that same year, through the help of volunteers.

Built to seat 120 people, the chapel was dedicated to St Garmon, or St Germanus of Auxerre, who visited North Wales in the fifth century to combat the Pelagian heresy then rife amongst the British clergy. The design has been attributed (in Coflein and elsewhere) to Clough Williams-Ellis, but the basis for this attribution is unclear; a contemporary press cutting, which is also illustrated by a photograph showing the original appearance of the chapel, names Maurice T. Pritchard of Blaenau Ffestiniog as architect.

In 1969 with the popularity of the resort growing and the congregation increasing, Pritchard was reappointed to extend the church, which he did by adding transepts. This work was completed in 1970 and included the fitting out of a sacristy and a small flat for a visiting priest on the lower level beneath the transepts.

The building was renovated and the lower level converted to a two-bedroom flat in 2001-02. In 2016 the church was closed and at the time of writing (August 2017) it remains unused. The lower floor accommodation remains in use as a holiday home/retreat. 

Description

The building is cruciform in plan with a holiday flat under the transepts and sanctuary. It is constructed of randomly coursed granite with ashlar granite quoins and lintels, and slate sills. The east, north and south walls of the transepts are rendered and the roofs are pitched with slate coverings. External decorative detailing is limited to a simple raised stone cross high on the east wall (early photographs show a bellcote atop the west gable end but this has been removed at some point). Below this there remains a projecting, gabled porch, while in the northeast corner there is a stair leading to an external landing, providing an emergency escape from the north transept. In the southeast corner is a lean-to extension to the lower floor accommodation. The windows throughout are double glazed with modern uPVC frames.

Inside the porch and sanctuary have stone floors, the centre aisle and crossing is carpeted and the transepts and nave have hardwood herringbone parquet coverings. The walls throughout are plastered and painted and the timber-framed roof is a king post truss construction. The nave is of four bays and the sanctuary one. The north transept has a partition at the north end with four doors, behind which are the sacristy, a former confessional and a store. The simple altar is made up of a large granite mensa set on two uprights constructed of squared granite blocks. Other sanctuary furnishings are a modern hardwood ambo, celebrant’s chair of carved, stained oak and an oak bench. The tabernacle is silvered with a PX detail on the door, replacing one now in store, which is painted gold with embossed Gothic detailing and an image of the pelican in her piety. A Gothic crucifix hangs on the east wall of the sanctuary, painted and with the emblems of the Evangelists at the terminals. In the south transept are a painted wooden statue of Our Lady and a painted plaster statue of St Thérèse. The foundation stone is at the east end of the north wall of the nave. A large black slate low-relief carving of St Garmon by Rosamund Fletcher is fixed to the west wall of the nave (formerly outside).

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In the early twentieth century the few Catholics living in the vicinity of the small port town of Amlwch had to travel to Holyhead, Bangor or Beaumaris for Mass, a considerable journey with each approximately fifteen miles away. In September 1922 the first Mass centre was opened in the town, in a converted stable to the rear of the Dinorben Hotel and served from Beaumaris. Between 1930 and 1933 a temporary chapel was established in the shooting lodge on the Marquess of Anglesey’s estate.

As the number of Catholics began to increase, thoughts of building a permanent church began to be considered and a site just outside the town was purchased. The Italian architect Giuseppe Rinvolucri (who had settled in Conwy) was appointed and work on the foundations began in 1932. The contractor was John Mayers Sons of Chester. Percy Iball of Rhyl was appointed foreman and was entrusted with building the reinforced concrete and brick structure of the church walls and roof, the front stonework and steps. The stone was sourced locally. The stonemason Mr Roberts, the joiner Mr Williams and other labourers were all local men. By early 1935 the stone walls of the lower part of the building (the hall) had been constructed.

The church, dedicated to Our Lady Star of the Sea and St Winefride, was blessed and opened by Bishop McGrath of Menevia in 1937. Its original appearance had the west front with a smooth concrete upper stage with a raised inscription in Welsh over the star window, NODDA NI SERREN Y MOR (Protect us, Star of the Sea).

In January 1941 the Oblate Fathers were invited to take over responsibility for the church, and it was initially served from Holyhead. In May 1943 Fr Denis Maher OMI was appointed first resident priest, and St Joseph’s presbytery at ‘Eryl Mor’ was built, housing three clergy. The parish covered approximately 200 square miles and Mass centres were later established at Llangefni (qv), Cemaes Bay (qv), and Gwalchmai.

In 1963 a mural painting in the apse depicting Christ Crucified against a backdrop of hills was created by Gordon Wallace of Colwyn Bay. This and marbled panels around the interior are shown in the contemporary photograph.  It may have been about this time that the rubble stonework of the lower part of the west front and lower side walls was rendered (shown in photo in Menevia Record, Winter 1964, p. 2), no doubt to protect the building from the elements.

In the 1990s the church was temporarily closed on account of structural concerns. It was around this time that its architectural and historical interest was officially recognised, with a Grade II* listing in 2000. In 2004 the parish priest, Fr Declan O’Keeffe OMI, was advised to close the church on a more permanent basis due to concerns over the safety of the concrete structure after many years of deterioration. In 2005 the Oblates decided to sell the building but following a campaign by architectural conservation groups, this decision was rescinded and Fr O’Keeffe began efforts to restore the building. A friends group was established to raise the funds to repair the church, and Christopher Thomas appointed project manager. An initial grant application to the Heritage Lottery Fund was unsuccessful and the original plans had to be scaled back. Eventually, thanks to the support of the OMI Trustees, Cadw, the Pilgrim Trust, the National Churches Trust, and the All Churches Trust an extensive two-phase project of work could begin. Phase one involved the replacement of the external roof coverings, making good and redecoration of external and internal walls, refurbishment of the original floors, renovation of the front and rear steps, new heating and lighting and new sanctuary furnishings. The church was reopened and rededicated by Bishop Regan of Wrexham on 1 May 2011. Phase two (renovation of the hall and installation of WCs) has recently been completed.

Description

Taking its cue from the location and dedication, the form of the church is inspired by from the inverted hull of a boat, with the nautical theme continuing in the port hole-like windows of the hall. The Buildings of Wales (1994, p. 93) highlights the similarity of the design with the airship hangars at Orly Airport, designed by Eugène Freyssinet in the 1920s. The building is fully described in the list entry (below), and repetition is unnecessary. However, the following changes and some new and original furnishings not highlighted in the list entry may be mentioned:

• The entrance porch (an early addition of 1938 by William S. Wort ARIBA, plans in Diocese of Wrexham archives) has been removed and the main entrance now opens into the rear of the nave.
• A slate plaque at the rear of the nave commemorates the reopening and rededication on 1 May 2011.
• A modern carved limewood statue of Our Lady Star of the Sea is fixed to the west wall of the nave.
• The extensive original oak herringbone parquet flooring has been restored.
• The benches are original and are of hardwood with moulded edges and green leather kneelers.
• The Stations of the Cross are original, possibly brought from the temporary chapel, and are painted quatrefoil-shaped ceramic reliefs with hardwood cross finials.
• The marble wall panelling has been removed and the walls plastered and painted white with the windows edged in sky blue.
• The original glass lenses in the roof lights were manufactured in France and a Chester firm made the small star-shaped windows in the east wall.
• The 1963 mural painting in the apse by Gordon Wallace has been painted out. A carved oak crucifix now hangs from the apex of the apse.
• New sanctuary fittings including an altar, ambo and tabernacle plinth of Welsh slate and two types of local granite were installed in 2011, made by a local sculptor. The altar and ambo are decorated with six-pointed stars inlaid in slate.
• The new brass tabernacle is cylindrical with a domed roof; the doors are decorated with applied crosses.

List description (superseded, for link to revised list entry, see below)

The Reference Number: 24455
Grade: II*
Date of Designation: 12/12/2000  
Date of Amendment: 12/12/2000  
Name of Property: Church of Our Lady Star of the Sea, St Winifred  
Unitary Authority: Isle of Anglesey  
Community: Amlwch  
Town: Amlwch  
Locality: Amlwch  
Easting: 243804  
Northing: 393101  
Street Side: N
Location: In an elevated position, set back from the N side of the A5025 on the way out to Porth Llechog (Bull Bay).  

History: C20 Roman Catholic church, built in the 1930s. Designed by G Rinvolucri, an Italian architect who was originally brought to Wales as a prisoner of war. He subsequently married a local woman, and lived and worked in north Wales, specialising in Roman Catholic churches. He also designed a number of other churches in Wales, including those at Abergele, and Porthmadog.  

Exterior: striking and individual Roman Catholic church which uses design elements embodying a nautical theme. The main body of the church is a high domed stressed concrete construction which has advanced ribs along its length, as the upturned hull of a boat. This is on a roughcast rendered plinth with portholes to each ‘ribbed’ bay. The entrance faces the road to the S, a dressed stone facade with raking sides, stepped up and surmounted by a plain stone cross. The main, central, entrance is reached by flanking flights of stone steps; a pointed arched doorway of 2 orders. Above the doorway is a star shaped light set within a mosaic surround. Below the main entrance, under the steps, is a square-headed doorway with flanking pointed arched windows. To the rear of the main body of the church is a flat roofed vestry accessed by a dog leg flight of stone steps with rubblestone walls; the top flight over a tall arch. A further doorway to the lower floor of the church is to the rear of the E wall.  

Interior: the main entrance leads into a small vestibule with raking sides; further doorways lead into the S end of the main body of the church. The ribbing that is such a prominent feature of the exterior of the church also dominates the design of the interior; the body of the church illuminated by bands of geometrically patterned lights between the ribs. The lateral walls have marble panels which also follow the pattern of the ribs; to the top are paired panels, each with a moulded quatrefoil plaques depicting biblical scenes, plain paired panels below. The marbled panels continue at the far end of the church, raised up over round-headed doorways flanking a recess painted with a depiction of the crucifixion; star shaped lights follow the line of the domed arch.  

Reason for designation: listed as a remarkable inter-war church, a highly unusual and experimental design which exploits the plastic qualities of its constructional material to create a powerfully expressive religious building.  

Following Taking Stock, the list entry was revised by Cadw in March 2025:

Listed Buildings – Full Report – HeritageBill Cadw Assets – Reports

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The town of Beaumaris began with the building of the castle in the late thirteenth century and it soon became the administrative centre for Anglesey. Its Norman French name ‘Beau Marais’ translates as beautiful marsh. The Ven. Rev. William Davies was imprisoned and then martyred in Beaumaris on 27 July 1593. According to pious legend, Fr Davies prophesised from the scaffold that Mass would not be said in the town again for another 300 years.

The town developed as a holiday resort in the nineteenth century after the completion of Thomas Telford’s Menai Bridge in 1826. However, it was not until 1898 (305 years after Fr Davies’ prophesy) that the Mass returned, when the Oblate Fathers from Holyhead established an Anglesey mission at Beaumaris. Mass was initially held in the town hall and then in a room over a butcher’s shop, a priest coming from Holyhead each weekend to serve the mission. Soon afterwards, the mission was served from Bangor and efforts to raise funds for a permanent church were instigated. Miss Amy Elizabeth Imrie (1870-1944), Catholic convert and heiress of the White Star shipping line in Liverpool, provided considerable financial assistance to the venture (she later entered the Poor Clares and became Abbess of Sclerder in Cornwall). Bishop Francis Mostyn of Menevia laid the foundation stone for the church on 22 September 1909 and it was opened the following year on Whit Sunday. The church was designed in Gothic style by Alfred Gilbertson of Liverpool, and was described by The Tablet at the time of the opening as ‘an added gem to an already charming watering-place’.

The priest lodged in a house opposite the church belonging to a Mrs Thompson until a presbytery was built around 1930 for the Rev. E. Hemphill. During the Second World War, Beaumaris became home to many evacuees from Liverpool as well as numerous Polish refugees, swelling the congregation considerably. At the time the parish priest, Fr Brady, purchased an old chapel in the town for use as a parish centre. The church was reordered after the Second Vatican Council, with the removal of the high altar and reredos and altar rails.

Description

The church is of the late Gothic Revival period with free and varied curvilinear tracery throughout, and is constructed of randomly coursed dark green stone with Talacre stone dressings. The building is fairly squat in appearance, similar in height to the surrounding housing. At the west end is a projecting canted porch with an original stone carved relief of the crucifixion in the gable over the entrance. Above this is a broad, low pointed arched west window with elaborate tracery. The nave is of four bays and the sanctuary is of one bay and side-lit by gabled pseudo-transepts. The sanctuary and nave are under a continuous ridge, separated by raised parapets and taller buttresses. There are carved stone cross finials at the top of each gable. A projecting sacristy at the southeast corner is connected to the presbytery by a short timber-framed cloister.

Inside, the nave is broad and aisleless, with a hammerbeam roof. The walls are plastered and painted, the floor carpeted. At the west end a pipe organ rests on a raised floor on the south side. The sanctuary is up one step, and has a hardwood herringbone parquet floor. Today it has a rather bare appearance, compared with its pre-Vatican II fitting out. The modern altar, ambo and tabernacle plinth are of solid oak and veneer, possibly by Ormesby of Scarisbrick. The sacristy and confessional are through the south wall; a matching portable baptismal font is located in the sacristy.

Furnishings include:

• Sections of what appear to be the original carved oak altar rails, with cusped tracery details, are set against the east wall of the sanctuary
• On either side of the chancel arch, matching Gothic carved oak plinths with emblems of the Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, carrying painted plaster statues of Our Lady of Lourdes and St Joseph
• An iron and brass Gothic votive stand is located at the east end of the nave
• In the nave, the Stations of the Cross are painted plaster with English text but are French in style
• The light fixtures are brass with large glass domes, the brass work decorated with cherubs; they appear to of some age, possibly original
• A large fibreglass relief at the west end of the nave depicts the Martyrdom of Blessed William Davies, its designer/maker not established
• In the porch, a painted plaster statue of Our Lady with the Holy Infant, in memory of Harold and Margaret Jones.

The post Anglesey (Beaumaris) – Our Lady Queen of Martyrs appeared first on Taking Stock.

In 1959 Bishop Petit of Menevia appointed Fr J. Jackson parish priest of Beaumaris. At that time Benllech was served from Beaumaris, with a regular Mass being held in a dance hall. The town had a small resident Catholic population but, as in many resort towns in North Wales, numbers were boosted during the summer months by holidaymakers. Upon appointment, Fr Jackson took charge of the fund for the construction of a permanent church, established by his predecessor Fr Rowlands. A plot was soon purchased at a cost of £950, but it would take a further five years of fundraising before construction began. A plan by a Caernarfon surveyor in the diocesan archives shows an early proposal for a traditionally-designed stone-built church with a pitched roof, transepts, and north porch. However, the design as built (by Stewart Powell Bowen of Colwyn Bay) was for a striking low-rise modern church with prominent steep monopitch roof sections, expressing the spirit of renewal and aggiornamento at the time of the Second Vatican Council (1962-65). The interior was flexibly planned to allow for small winter congregations and larger summer ones, with seating and standing spaces on separate levels. Construction started in 1964 and was completed the following year, at a total cost of £15,500. The church was opened by Bishop Petit on 5 September 1965.

Today the church is served from Amlwch by the Oblate Fathers.

Description

The church is located on a slightly sloping site with ramps and steps leading from the small car park. It is set on a plinth of grey engineering bricks except for the sanctuary, which is set on a plinth of rubble coursed granite. The exterior walls are faced with a painted roughcast render. The windows are timber framed with slate sills and the doors are timber with glazed panels. The monopitch roofs are covered with slate and copper and the flat roofs have felt coverings. There is a simple thin cross of painted steel fixed to the west wall. The entrance is located between the projecting baptistery and sacristy.

Inside, a small porch leads on to a narthex/standing area with the former baptistery (baptismal font not present) in the west corner (currently used as a choir area), and the sacristy in the east corner. The flooring is a mixture of is carpeting and quarry tiles. The ceilings are covered with pine tongue and groove boarding. The standing area is top lit by five deep-set skylights; a pine balustrade along the front is a later health and safety precaution. Steps and a ramp (another recent addition) lead down into the main worship area; the north wall is angled towards the sanctuary that lies to the east. The sanctuary is up one step (original communion rails removed) with the altar up three further steps; it is a double-height space flooded with light from the large skylights, in contrast to the low ceiling of the main worship area. The altar is located close to the front of the sanctuary; it is constructed of massive slabs of Penrhyn slate. The brass, cylindrical tabernacle is placed on the back wall set on a hardwood bracket with a slate above on which a slender wood and metal crucifix is placed; above this is a striking sculptured fish emblem with PX detail.

Other furnishings include painted ceramic Stations of the Cross, modern painted wood statues of Our Lady of the Rosary and the Sacred Heart and a marble memorial by the sacristy door commemorating Blessed William Davies, martyred in Beaumaris on 27 July 1593. The hardwood benches are original to the church. 

Following Taking Stock, the church was listed grade II in March 2025:

Listed Buildings – Full Report – HeritageBill Cadw Assets – Reports

Entry amended by AHP 31.03.2025

The post Anglesey (Benllech) – Our Lady of Lourdes appeared first on Taking Stock.

In 1943 Fr Maher celebrated the first Mass in Cemaes Bay since the Reformation, in Ye Olde Vigour public house for the small number of Catholics living in the vicinity of the town.

In 1963 work started on the building of the Wylfa nuclear power station, just west of the town. Among the many construction workers were numerous Irish Catholics, for whom Fr J. A. Taaffe OMI was appointed chaplain. This being a long-term project (the power station becoming operational in 1971), the community decided to erect a purpose-built church in Cemaes Bay. A town centre site acquired, on which stood a pair of dilapidated stone cottages; these were demolished in 1964 to make way for the new church. Fr Tom Purcell OMI laid the first brick on 12 June 1964 and on 1 March 1965 the church was opened and blessed by Fr Purcell. The workers from the power station undertook the demolition and construction work.

The church was built as a chapel-of-ease, served from Amlwch. The Oblate Fathers closed it in November 2017 and at the time of writing (August 2018) the building remains unused and emptied of many of its furnishings.

Description

It was not possible to access the building so limited details were gathered by an external inspection. The church is brick-built, with a pitched pantile roof. There is a flat-roofed projecting porch at the west end; a fibreglass statue of St David is mounted on a marble plinth fixed to the wall of the porch.

The porch leads into the nave, which has three bays. The sanctuary at the east end is up two steps and is flanked by rooms that appear to be the sacristy and a confessional or store. The floor is covered with vinyl tiles and carpet in the centre aisle; the walls are bare brick and the ceiling plastered, there are brick wall plinths for statues either side of the sanctuary. The altar is modern and veneered light oak possibly by Ormesby of Scarisbrick, and there appears to be a plaster statue of St Joseph to the rear of the nave.

The post Anglesey (Cemaes Bay) – St David appeared first on Taking Stock.

The town of Holyhead was until the sixteenth century called Caergybi after St Cybi, a sixth century monk and cousin of St David, who founded a monastery here around 540AD on the site of a former fortress. Viking invaders destroyed the monastery in the tenth century and the present thirteenth century church of St Cybi now occupies the site.  

Large numbers of Irish workers began to arrive in the town with their families in 1846 to help with the construction of the harbour. As Holyhead developed into the principle mail-packet station for Ireland the stream of immigrants continued, especially during the Great Famine. The first resident priest was Fr Fennelly in 1853, who used a room in South Stack vaults. This first Mass centre was followed by rooms in houses opposite the Pelham gates, in Well Street, and over R. Kleiser’s shop in Stanley Street.

Following Fr Fennelly, a Franciscan, Fr Bonaventure, was appointed; seeing the need for a permanent place of worship and in spite of local opposition he obtained a plot in Market Street. The church of St Mary, Help of Christians was opened and blessed in 1860; it was a simple stone-built Gothic Revival chapel that could seat approximately 150 people, with an adjoining presbytery.

In 1895, Bishop Francis Mostyn of Menevia invited the Oblate Fathers to take charge of the mission. The Rev. Richard D’Alton made plans for a school and a new church; the school was opened in 1905 but the church never came to fruition.

By the 1960s the condition of the old church and the limited space it offered for a community of about 1,000 parishioners led to a decision to build a new church. Work started on this in January 1964 with the demolition of the old church and presbytery, with the new church built on the same site but set back on the sloping site to give it a more elevated position relative to other buildings on Market Street. The architects were Edmund Kirby & Sons of Liverpool and the contractor Sandham Ltd of Heswall, Cheshire; the cost was £50,000. The church was opened on 28 February 1965. Its original appearance includes slab-in-resin or dalle de verre windows.

In 1992 a new presbytery and hall with library were added. Between 2003 and 2004 a full set of stained glass windows were commissioned from Alan Davis, replacing original dalle de verre glass in the main worship area and adding new glass above the entrance. The cost of the scheme was approximately £80,000. In 2008 the church was seriously damaged by vandals, including damage to the font; the cost of repairs was over £14,000. More recently a large sandstone sculpture entitled Incarnation/The Love of God by Julie Winter has been erected at the bottom of the steps in front of the church.  

Description

The building is square on plan and is a concrete framed construction; it has a pitched roof topped by a large central lantern clerestorey with pyramid roof structure and a tall steel finial. The walls are of buff brick over a plinth of engineering bricks with a concrete sill. The roof covering is copper, the windows metal framed. At the front is a projecting porch and there is projecting sacristy to the rear with felt covered roof.

Inside, the entrance porch has a quarry tiled floor and steps and bare brick walls. There is a small piety shop to one side (probably the original baptistery) and a glazed screen with doors at the top a short flight of steps that lead into the main worship area. The narthex is not separated from the main worship area but above is a gallery; to the rear of the narthex is a shrine of St Eugene de Mazenod with a relic of the saint. The main space is a single volume, square on plan, with the raised central area and clerestorey carried on piers. The walls are faced with a mixture of bare brick and hardwood timber panelling, while the floor covering is of multi-coloured vinyl tiles (carpeted in the centre alley). Seating in the main worship area is hardwood benches, arranged in a traditional west-east fashion with aisles either side; the sanctuary is up one step with the altar up a further three steps. To the north of the sanctuary is a Lady Chapel and to the south a chapel to St Joseph, each with hardwood altar rails. The sanctuary and side chapel floors are quarry tiled with some carpeting.

The following furnishings are of note:

• The high altar is original to the church, and is constructed of Verdi Issoire and Botticino marble, decorated with carved and painted A Ω and PX details
• The tabernacle is silvered, cylindrical and domed. It was presented by J. H. Keegan in memory of his wife and daughter
• The altars of the side chapels match the materials of the high altar; the Lady altar has a carved and painted M and the St Joseph altar a saw and axe. Above each altar are carved wooden statues of Our Lady and St Joseph
• The mahogany font is now located at the east end of the main worship area
• A full set of stained glass windows by Alan Davis installed between 2003 and 2004 is on the themes of the Mysteries of Light, The Resurrection and Mary Help of Christians
• In the shrine of St Eugene de Mazenod, two stained glass windows from the old church, one depicting St Joseph and St Mary (in the style of Mayer of Munich), the other St Patrick and the Sacred Heart
• In the side chapels, abstract collages by Linda Vaughan on the themes of Absence and Presence.

The post Anglesey (Holyhead) – St Mary Help of Christians appeared first on Taking Stock.

St Cyngar brought Christianity to Llangefni in the sixth century and Mass continued to be held on Anglesey until Blessed William Davies was martyred at Beaumaris in 1594. The first Mass known to have been held in Llangefni in post-Reformation times was conducted by Fr John Brady from Beaumaris in a local house in 1938. Soon afterwards, a building in Bulkeley Square was used as a Mass centre until 1949, when a building at 64 Bridge Street was acquired. A temporary structure, this soon proved inadequate for the growing congregation. In 1960 a church of portal frame construction, faced in local stone was proposed as a replacement building on the same site. Designed by L. A. G. Prichard & Son of Liverpool, this was later abandoned in favour of a more modern (and cheaper) design by the same architects (the drawings were prepared by Jerzy Faczynski, who had previously worked on a number of important designs for Weightman & Bullen, notably St Mary, Leyland). The main contractors were Watkin Jones and Son Ltd, while Fr James Butler OMI of Amlwch oversaw the project.

The church was opened and dedicated on 2 May 1971 by Bishop Petit of Menevia and consecrated on 10 May by Bishop Langton Fox, Bishop of Maura. Originally it had a large west window in the form of a cross, containing dalle de verre glass by Dom Charles Norris OSB of Buckfast Abbey; however this more recently been removed, the opening blocked and the west elevation rendered.

The church is served from Beaumaris.

Description

The church was built in 1970-71 from designs by Lionel A. G. Prichard & Son of Liverpool. Modern in design, it is square on plan and of steel framed construction with red and buff brick walls, now rendered to the front. The steeply-pitched roof is cross-gabled and covered with pantiles, with flat roofs over the sacristy and parish room to the rear. There is a modern steel-framed fléche surmounted by a cross at the centre of the roof. The windows are double glazed with clear glass and uPVC frames. There are steps and a ramped approach to a projecting flat-roofed porch at the main entrance.

A slate plaque in the porch marks the opening and dedication of the church. The porch leads into the square worship area and the sanctuary is at the east end. The sacristy is beyond the east wall, accessed through a doorway next to the baptistery, while the entrance to the parish room is to the north of the sanctuary. The interior is a single spacious volume, with the steel framing of the roof exposed. The mahogany benches (by Hearne of Waterford) are laid in a conventional west to east layout and the baptistery is in an alcove in the east wall south of the sanctuary. The floor of the worship area is carpeted; the walls throughout are painted brickwork with areas of timber panelling.

The sanctuary is up two steps; its furnishings were provided by Christopher O’Neill & Co. Ltd. of Carrickmines, Dublin. The altar, lectern, tabernacle plinth, and top of the communion rails are in grey Sicilian marble, the sanctuary (and baptistery) floors and the pillars of the communion rails are in Rosa Aurea marble, while there is dove grey marble panelling on the east wall of the sanctuary and on the risers of the steps. The font is in white Sicilian marble with a dove grey marble plinth and wooden cover with cross finial; it is set on castors to be portable. The tabernacle (by Hayes & Finch of Liverpool) is square with a pyramid top and finial cross, it is silvered and hammered. Above the sanctuary is a large painted and carved crucifix.

At the east end of the south wall is a modern hardwood side altar dedicated to the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales, with an inlaid image of the Holy Spirit on the altar front, a carved crucifix of Christ the King, a crown, and plaques with the names of the Martyrs on the canopied reredos. Other furnishings include a pair of timber statues of Our Lady with the Holy Infant and St Joseph with the Holy Infant, on matching Gothic hardwood plinths. The Stations of the Cross are of Linden wood, by G. V. Mussner of Bolzano, Italy. There is a modern polychrome plaster statue of St James the Less, a polychrome plaster statue St Thérèse of Lisieux, a large gold painted plaster bust of St Eugene de Mazenod (founder of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate), all in the nave, and a modern polychrome wood statue of St Joseph in the porch.

A west window with dalle de verre glass was designed and executed by Dom. Charles Norris OSB of Buckfast Abbey, this has since been removed and the opening blocked.

The post Anglesey (Llangefni) – St Joseph appeared first on Taking Stock.