St Mary, Banham, Norfolk
A massive, affluent south Norfolk village, unwanted fat and sleepy like an aged cat on this day of superior heat in August 2018, and the well known check out of its parish church of St Mary is from the green – the village signal, the war memorial, and then that spectacular spire lifting to heaven. It rises a lot more than 40 metres, and is produced of ribbed guide, extremely similar to the one particular around the border at Hadleigh in Suffolk. It experienced been a very long time because I past frequented Banham church, extensive ample back for its size and presence to have astonished me. The making is very a lot all of a piece, early 14th century. The Victorians brought the east window, which Sam Mortlock considered relatively abnormal in its exuberance, but the wealth of flowing tracery somewhere else in the church retains up effectively in opposition to it.
You stage into a significant, nicely-retained jewel. Though, inevitably, there was a large Victorian restoration listed here, there is nonetheless a experience of simplicity, with brick flooring and a bit cluttered furnishings, all overshadowed by a impressive west conclude organ. Significant over, the roof bears the date 1622, and the small George III royal arms glimpse like a postage stamp over the significant tower arch. The star of the clearly show is the luscious range of 19th and early 20th Century glass, much of it the function of Powell & Sons. The 1857 east window, unusually, is a cavalcade of geometric models in pressed glass, with at its centre a crucifixion. The artist was John Clayton, a vigorous scene, his watchers searching up in an agony, displaying what he was able of before Alfred Bell arrived along and produced him major. It is reminiscent of the function of Robert Bayne in the similar 10 years.
The other 19th Century Powell & Sons glass is to the styles of the wonderful Henry Getaway. The earliest echoes the design and style of the east window, with medallions of the Baptism of Christ, the Adoration of the angels at the Nativity, and the Ascension of Christ. The most effective, in the south aisle, depicts gorgeously prosperous figures of the four Evangelists, each and every in their personal light around two home windows.
The richness of these was echoed half a century afterwards by a Powell & Sons window of 1936, which is in all probability the freshest and most unforgettable point in the complete church. The risen Christ stands in between two lights, 1 depicting spring with sheep grazing beneath an apple tree in blossom, the other autumn with the tree in fruit over rabbits and birds. It would be interesting to know who the artist was. The window beside it of the Presentation in the Temple is by Kempe & Co, and seems curiously out of area as if basically not talking the similar language, but then I have under no circumstances been a supporter of Kempe glass.
The earliest English glass is in the chancel, a vary of the twelve disciples and a Tudor arms all in a pre-Ecclesiological design and style. It possibly dates from the 1830s, and has not worn well, the painted information have very long since pale and all that remains are mosaics of colored glass suggesting human figures. Nonetheless, there is a pretty good 16th Century continental graphic of the Blessed Virgin and youngster in the north aisle, gathered from elsewhere and set in this article in the 1960s. In the east window of that aisle is a one 19th Century panel depicting Christ with Martha and Mary at Bethany, which would seem so odd to discover in isolation that I assume it might much too have appear from elsewhere.
At the east finish of this aisle lies a picket knight, life-dimension and relatively serious in his simplicity within his tomb recess. He is commonly believed to be Sir Hugh Bardolph, founder of the church, but as Pevsner drily notes, presented that Bardolph died in 1203 and this effigy is early 14th Century, it is a little bit much too considerably of an afterthought. Woodwork of a afterwards time surmounts the font on its stepped pedestal, a grand gothic font deal with of the 1860s that could possibly consider its inspiration from the Albert Memorial. The screen arrived up coming, and by the finish of the century the two richly carved reredoses in the sanctuary and the north aisle chapel.
On this day of dazzling sunshine on a working day in significant summer, the temperature dipping up into the thirties, this felt a very pleased, self-confident place, a real statement of 14th Century self-assurance coupled with 19th Century piety and electrical power. But I remembered currently being listed here after ahead of, some fifteen decades ago, late on a December afternoon. The small sunlight designed the shadows long, and within the church the south aisle home windows glowed as if they were being on hearth as the nave and chancel darkened. And as I sat there, the day faded. I could barely see the configurations on my camera any much more, but Christ in the apple orchard nevertheless glowed fiercely, the brightest of the jewels, as if on its own keeping again the sinking sunlight. And then, as the afternoon deepened, the home windows all around darkened, like stars fading, and this was the final to go out.
Posted by Simon Knott on 2018-08-13 07:00:14
Tagged: , Banham , Norfolk , East Anglia
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