St Peter's Church, Storer Road, Loughborough (Grade II)

Church. 1910-12. By W S Weatherley of London and G H Barrowcliff of Barrowcliff and Allcock, Loughborough. Lady Chapel 1958 by Albert Herbert of Leicester. Local Mountsorrel granite rubble with stone dressings and plain tile roof with stone coped gables with kneelers and finials. Gothic style with buttresses with set-offs. Plan of nave and chancel in one with north Lady Chapel and south organ chamber and vestry. Narrow passage aisles and north and south porches. Chancel has 7-light east window with Decorated tracery and 2-light windows to north and south. Lady Chapel has 3-light windows. Organ chamber to south has 2-light window and ashlar gabled bell-cote to side over vestry which has flat arched windows and curving parapet. Nave is of 5 bays and has 4 3-light clerestory windows either side over the aisles which have narrow lancets. North and south proches are similar and have moulded arches and double doors within with elaborate metal decoration. West end has 7-light window with fine Decorated tracery.
INTERIOR: Walls of buff coloured rendered plaster with ancaster stone dressings. East window has fine stained glass. Wooden reredos with carved and panelled altar canopy and riddle posts with angel finials, both designed by Weatherley. Elaborate sedilia and piscine in south wall. Carved choir stalls and communion rail. Organ of 1913 has panelled and carved case. Panelled and boarded chancel roof. Pulpit in carved wood on stone base. Nave arcades of moulded arches dying into hexagonal piers with shafts rising to panelled and boarded nave roof. Aisle roofs similar. Aisle lancets are filled with stained glass of 1920s and 1930s. Unusual font of beaten copper and iron. First World War memorial on west wall which was designed by Weatherley and made by Robinsons, Marsham Street, London, and which consists of a tryptich, the inner panel with the names of the Fallen and the inner sides of the doors with panels depicting Saints George and Michael.
HISTORY: This church replaced the earlier mission church which had been built in 1889 and extended in 1892 to serve a new community. This followed the development of several streets of housing principally for those employed by a large supplier of greenhouses and agricultural and other machinery, Messenger and Co.
SUMMARY OF IMPORTANCE: This is a carefully designed church which is built of the unusual purple granite of nearby Mountsorrel. The imposing line of the nave and chancel is augmented by the aisles, Lady Chapel and vestry. The interior is lofty and spacious with the nave arcades and passage aisles adding to the grandeur of the building. The good quality contemporary fittings survive together with stained glass of the first half of the C20 and the whole church is remarkably intact.