Hoole URC
Hoole, Cheshire
The origins of the church go back to 1887 when a preaching station was set up in a house in Faulkner Street, in 1908 a small site was bought in Walker Street and a 'tin tabernacle' was erected as a Congregational Church.
The current church, aside from its 15th century tower, was built around 1876. It was designed by William Butterfield, one of the most prominent figures of the Victorian Gothic Revival and architect of Keble College, Oxford. He is sometimes described as the Oxford Movement's most original architect. It is a Grade II* listed building and the only Butterfield church in Cheshire among nearly 100 he designed across England.
The building embodies an architectural realism expressed through colourful contrasts of texture and pattern - a structural polychromy that became the defining aesthetic of the late Victorian period. It also contains ten windows by Charles E Kempe (1837–1907), one of the foremost influences in stained glass design of the Victorian period. There is a rich social history found in the church's family chapels, historic pews, dedicated windows, and significant family memorials, which suggest its use by wealthy Liverpool and Manchester merchants in Victorian times.
The church is also surrounded by a living churchyard of two to three acres which provides a growing habitat for local flora and fauna.