Kitchens in Churches

The sloping cover at Winterbourne Earls and Great Cheverell.

The first time I opened one of those church cabinets with sloping covers I was astonished to find a fitted kitchen inside and to realise that the slope was to accommodate a new shiny tap. Usually the fitted kitchen is no more than a sink, a draining board and a huge amount of storage space in a prime position in front of a window or a monument. These four sloping examples (above and below) are all from Wiltshire, and the slope means that they’re not useful for climbing on to take good close ups of the windows they block.

The sloping cover at Seend and West Lavington.

The alternative to the slope is the sink and tap cover I found in the lovely church at Hatherop (below) that makes you wonder why a source of water should be so ugly that you need to cover it up.

Discrete tap cover at Hatherop, Gloucestershire.

I have found more ramshackle examples of kitchens in churches. At Brinklow you have everything you need in a small wooden cabinet dwarfed by the organ and at Savernake there is a modesty curtain around a very substantial counter. At Shipton under Wychwood there was no attempt to hide the perfect combination of welcome note, water in a bottle for the kettle, tea bags and a plastic tray for your cups (left to right below).

Left to right: Brinklow, Leicestershire; Savernake, Wiltshire; Shipton under Wychwood, Oxfordshire.

The Wantage church kitchen is in the north transept and the huge amount of storage space here - including a fridge and wall units - means that the folding doors cut across the stained glass window. There are no cookers in these kitchens that I can see, and as yet no extractor fans set into the stained glass above.

Open and shut at Wantage, Oxfordshire.

The kitchen at Middleton Cheney church was in use when I visited and I see from my photo (below left) that so was the toilet. These facilities are installed in the west end of the church, directly underneath the most beautiful Burne Jones window, which I’ve described previously on my blog (link here). On my first visit I was shocked that a banner on the balustrade blocked a clear view of this important window, on my second visit I was invited up on to the bellringing platform to get a really good look at the stained glass.

West wall at Middleton Cheney, Oxfordshire with window by Edward Burne-Jones.

My conclusion from these examples is that kitchens and stained glass don’t look good together, if kitchens in churches is a craze I hope it ends soon.

Some Cotswold Churches

St. Michael and St. Martin’s Church, Eastleach Martin: west window.

On the signpost opposite the church of St. Michael and St Martin (above left) are all the villages that we visited on this walk in Gloucestershire, just north of Lechlade as the signpost says. There are two churches at Eastleach with a river running between them, they are both lovely from the outside and the inside. As is usual for churches in the care of The Churches Conservation Trust, the only not so tasteful thing in the building is the sign that tells you about the Trust at the west end of the church (above right). In most of the windows the only colour is a yellow border strip, some have fragments of medieval glass in them and how exciting this seems in the face of all this plainness (below).

Eastleach Martin: looking east and medieval glass fragments in chancel.

St. Andrew’s Church, Eastleach Turville: looking west.

St Andrew’s Church across the river is even simpler and plainer despite being in use for services, with a beautiful bible out on a lectern. The windows are filled with diamonds or squares, some with spectacular mends that link with the branches outside (below).

Eastleach Turville, east window and south nave window.

St. Nicholas Church, Hatherop, south chapel.

A short walk across to Hatherop, another church with a saddleback tower and a calm, uncluttered interior. The south chapel (above right), its windows filled in with white plastic sheet, is particularly lovely. It was built as a mortuary in 1855 by the architect Henry Clutton with the assistance of William Burges and is filled with rich carving. There is also a beautiful marble monument to Barbara, Lady Mauley who died in 1844, an angel at her feet and another at her head (below).

Marble monument by Raffaelle Monti to Barbara, Lady de Mauley.

St Peter’s Church, Southrop: east and west windows with bits of colour and detail.

The last church was at Southrop, equally clean, coordinated and simple (above), and honestly by now I could hardly remember which interior went with which church.

When church visiting I’ve started imagining that if I lived nearby, would I look forward to attending a service in that church. Some have the wrong sort of atmosphere for me, like a damp guesthouse, and I walk straight out, it’s a good way of assessing what I want from a church interior. On that basis, this group of Cotswolds churches, although superb in terms of interior decoration, are a bit austere for me, not giving enough in terms of colour or meaning.