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John
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The Victorian Church
In 1856, Samuel Brooks purchased a large area of ground alongside
the recently opened Manchester to Altrincham railway. The railway
company opened a new station for the area and named it Brooklands.
‘Old Stink o’ Brass’ as Samuel Brooks was jokingly called (for
he was a tough but friendly Lancashire man with a liking for
repartee) had made a fortune in banking in Manchester, whilst
indulging at the same time his passion for land development.
Having transformed large parts of Sale and created a garden
suburb at Whalley Range, he entered upon his new project with
equal vigour in his retirement. He successfully drained the
marshy ground and built a road running southeast across it for
one and a quarter miles as straight as an arrow. Stately mansions
were built on each side by wealthy businessmen, and trees lined
the road presenting a green avenue of pine, beech, lime and
poplar. But Samuel Brooks was a churchman and he knew that to
make a district into a community, it needed a church. He had
already built a church at Whalley Range and now he looked around
for a competent architect for his Brooklands church. He decided
to employ a young Manchester architect called Alfred Waterhouse
who had recently won renown with his plans for the Manchester
Assize Courts. Brooks gave 8500 square yards of land and granted
£10,000 for the building and endowment of the church, which
was to be ‘the centrepiece of a respectable suburb’. This at
a time when churches in Manchester were being built for £2,000.
Work began in 1864 but was delayed by the death of Samuel Brooks
later that year. Waterhouse had not previously built an Anglican
church, and despite his growing reputation for secular buildings
such as the Assize Courts and Strangeways Goal, St John’s was
not an easy commission. There existed a powerful society in
the 1860s – the Cambridge Camden Society – which had over the
years dictated how Anglican churches should (and indeed must)
be built. Even architects of the stature of Gilbert Scott and
Butterfield awaited its critical pronouncements anxiously. ‘Laws’
were laid down on the length and width of the Nave, the length
of the Chancel, the number of steps leading up to it, and where
to place the Fonts and Pulpits and Reading Desks. And there
were many more strictures. Waterhouse as a young man cautiously
obeyed many of these laws at St John’s. Towards the end of his
career when famous and much in demand, he was able to ignore
them as is noticeable at St Elizabeth’s, Reddish, where the
difference between the two churches can be attributed partly
to the development of his ideas over a period of 30 years. At
St John’s, which was completed in 1868, he concentrated on the
building itself and not its ornamentation. It is built of good
Yorkshire stone with two fine facades to the east and west.
The interior is lined with cream and brown brickwork in horizontal
stripes and diaper work (‘Bristol Byzantine’ some called it).
The plan is simple – small transepts, no aisles, no clerestory
and roofed in one span. The four columns supporting the transept
arches were kept plain and squat and there was no tower or spire
other than a small bell fleche, which was destroyed in a fire
in 1945. An interesting feature is the double gabled roofs to
the transepts. In 1968 (the centenary) the church hall was built
alongside the west end of the church. It is a fine building
in its own right and has proved invaluable in the work of the
church for this parish, yet one feels Waterhouse would have
regretted the concealment of much of the west façade, which
was considered the finest elevation of the church.
Finally, the stained glass should be mentioned. Waterhouse
did not approve of strong, bright colours but the glass installed
in the late 19th century is exciting and of a high
standard. A wrought-iron chancel screen, designed by Henry
Wilson of the Arts and Crafts movement, was an attractive
addition in 1907.
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Alfred Waterhouse 1830-1905
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Samuel Brooks 1793-1864
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