St Mary The Virgin's Church, Swanley , Kent

St Mary The Virgin's Church, Swanley Church

Image Source: John Vigar

St. Mary the Virgin is the Parish Church of Swanley, a small commuter town close to the present-day boundary with Greater London. The area grew with the arrival of the London to Dover railway and was previously known as Swanley Junction to avoid confusing it with the nearby village then named Swanley. In the 1950s it dropped the Junction suffix and became simply Swanley, with the original settlement renamed as Swanley Village. The Church of England arrived relatively late to this area, which until the mid-19th century was mainly agricultural. In 1860-61 Swanley (Village) received its church, St. Paul's, designed by Ewan Christian, while Swanley (Junction) had to wait until 1894 when an iron Mission Church, administered by St. Paul's for the new community that was rapidly being built alongside the railway line, was erected close to the main London to Dover road. This church was superseded by the present St. Mary the Virgin, a huge, hulking structure designed by architect Dudley Newman and built between 1900-1901 on a plot of land given by the Rt. Hon. Sir William Hart-Dyke, whose ancestral seat was the manor house and estate known as Lullingstone Castle, and whose descendants still occupy the house today. It was supposed to have had a larger nave, extending westwards into the churchyard and a south aisle was also planned, to cater for the expanding population of the town. Due to a lack of funds, it was never finished, and the missing pieces of this red brick, Gothic church are starkly picked out in yellow brick, which was presumably meant to be a temporary arrangement until the work could resume. The proposed plans and architect's impression of how St. Mary's would have looked, including a tall slender spire, are on display in the entrance foyer at the west end. This modern extension, including a Parish Hall to the south west, was added in 1976. The chancel now occupies almost half the interior space, overlooked by tall, Gothic windows that let a lot of natural light into the building. The organ, with its gallery on the second floor of the north transept (the south transept was never built), came from Alexandra Palace in London. St. Mary's has always maintained a High Church / Anglo-Catholic style of worship and today is a Forward in Faith church, under the episcopal care of the Bishop of Richborough. The stained-glass windows are located on the north wall of the church, with three in the nave and a further three in a small enclosed Lady Chapel on the ground floor of the north transept, adjoining the chancel. There are a number of good quality ecclesiastical furnishings, including a statuette of Our Lady of Walsingham placed near the altar at the end of the south aisle; a 1960s representation of Christ the King above the Blessed Sacrament Tabernacle beneath the east window - and in place of a pulpit, there is an ornately carved wooden reading desk. Text by Rob Baker

1851 Census Details

Seating Capacity: Not built

Morning Attendance: Not built

Afternoon Attendance: Not built

Evening Attendance: Not built

Architecture Details

Original Build Date/Architect: Newman 1901

Restoration:

Second Restoration:

Notes

Website

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