Friday, August 14, 2015

The Pugin brothers: Saint Mary's, Warrington


I'm jealous of a friend of mine, a seminarian of the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter, who lately had the opportunity to visit that Fraternity's latest acquisition: a splendid Gothic revival church in Cheshire (the archdiocese of Liverpool): the church of Saint Mary's, Warrington. The church was built by the Benedictine monks of Ampleforth Abbey beginning in 1875, which they managed to operate continuously all the way up to 2012! The church was designed by Edward Welby Pugin, Augustus's oldest son and successor to the business. Unfortunately, Edward died shortly after breaking ground (at 41, just one year longer than his father), but his younger brother, Peter Paul Pugin, assumed the project and took it to completion in 1877.

Here are some pictures my friend took. You'll see that Edward's style gradually diverged from Augustus's, particularly after 1859. Augustus's churches were usually of "country parish" proportions with very deep and narrow chancels, while Edward eventually addressed some of Cardinal Newman's criticisms against his father's work and brought the Gothic revival in line with "Tridentine" norms: smaller chancels, wider altars, and no rood screens to obscure the people's view of the high altar, to name a few. At the same time, Edward greatly enhanced the "vertical" aspect so that, in true Gothic style, even a common city parish was sure to make you feel like an ant inside it.










5 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  2. Beautiful...uplifting...thank you for sharing these pics!

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  3. Good sir, am I right to assume you live around Our Lady of the Atonement? I too am a relentless laudator temporis acti. My family and I live 1 minute away from and attend that wonderful church. Could you kindly contact me at x86gamecoder [at] gmail [dot] com? I have a literary fellowship here in San Antonio that reads and revels in the great works of Western Civilization and Christendom ... sort of a poor man's Inklings. http://www.meetup.com/Discarded-Image-Society/

    In Pax Christi,
    Steven Augustine

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  4. Oh yes, I am a regular visitor to your wonderful site. I am a slightly older version of you: medievalist, relic to the modern world, lover of fantasy, fantasy games, symphonic/power metal (Malmsteen, Gamma Ray, Rhapsody, etc), computer RPGs (I've made a few dungeon crawlers in my time), great architecture, great music, and great liturgy.

    Cheers,
    Steven Augustine

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