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London Metropolitan Archives

WARWICK GARDENS CHAPEL, KENSINGTON


IDENTITY STATEMENT

Reference code(s): N/M/013

Held at: London Metropolitan Archives

Title: WARWICK GARDENS CHAPEL, KENSINGTON

Date(s): 1895-1904

Level of description: Collection

Extent: 0.05 linear metres

Name of creator(s): Methodist Church of Great Britain x United Methodist Church x Wesleyan Methodist Church x Primitive Methodist Church

CONTEXT

Administrative/Biographical history:

The Warwick Gardens Methodist Chapel was built in 1863 to designs by Lockwood and Mawson and demolished in about 1927. It represented a movement by local Wesleyans to broaden their scope and, in William Pepperell's words, 'plant chapels in more respectable localities, such as that of Warwick-gardens'.

The initiative came from the Bayswater Circuit of the Methodist Conference, to which the chapel was formally attached. It appears that there was a competition for the building, probably in mid 1862. The foundation stone for Lockwood and Mawson's chapel was laid in May 1863. The prominent site, at the south corner of Pembroke Gardens and Warwick Crescent (now Gardens), was taken from Lord Kensington on a long lease. The exterior, Geometric in style, was of red brick with black bands and Bath stone dressings, and had aisles, a high roof, and a slim tower and spire in the south-west position. Inside was a timber arcade and the usual array of galleries, while in a semi-basement were schoolrooms 'and a residence for the chapel-keeper'.

The finished chapel, opened on 10 December 1863, contained some 1,100 sittings. But Pepperell reported in 1871 that an average congregation amounted to some 200 only, and 'a number of these are from a distance, and properly belonging to other Methodist congregations'. The Reverend C. Maurice Davies, visiting a few years later, offered a livelier impression. 'There was generally a shiny look about the chapel, as though everything, including the congregation, had been newly varnished. The seats were low, the galleries retiring, and everything in the most correct ecclesiastical taste. The position of the pulpit was strange to me; and the addition of a table covered with red baize surmounted by a small white marble font with a chamber towel ready for use, did not diminish the peculiarity. . . . The pulpit had succeeded in attaining the "Eastward position", but the table at its base did very well for a quasi-altar, and was flanked, north and south, by two semi-ecclesiastical hall chairs of oak. The font was locomotive, and might be supposed to occupy its abnormal position under protest.'

Pepperell's forebodings may have been accurate, for the chapel never attained much prosperity or influence. In about 1925 it was closed, its site sold to the Prudential Assurance Company, and shortly afterwards houses were built upon the site.

From: 'Churches and chapels: Non-Anglican denominations', Survey of London: volume 42: Kensington Square to Earl's Court (1986), pp. 386-394.

CONTENT

Scope and content/abstract:

Two issues of The Methodist Recorder, 1895 and 1904.

ACCESS AND USE

Language/scripts of material: English

System of arrangement:

Two items.

Conditions governing access:

Available for general access.

Conditions governing reproduction:

Copyright: Depositor

Physical characteristics:

Fit

Finding aids:

Please see online catalogues at: http://search.lma.gov.uk/opac_lma/index.htm

ARCHIVAL INFORMATION

Appraisal, destruction and scheduling information:

Accruals:

Archival history:

Immediate source of acquisition:

Deposited in 1971 (AC/71/024).

ALLIED MATERIALS

Existence and location of originals:

Existence and location of copies:

Related material:

See also N/M/012.

Publication note:

DESCRIPTION NOTES

Note:

Rules or conventions: Compiled in compliance with General International Standard Archival Description, ISAD(G), second edition, 2000; National Council on Archives Rules for the Construction of Personal, Place and Corporate Names, 1997.

Date(s) of descriptions: January to March 2009


INDEX ENTRIES
Subjects
Methodism | Protestant nonconformity | Protestantism | Christianity | Ancient religions | Religions
Methodists | Protestant nonconformists | Protestants | Christians | Religious groups
Nonconformist chapels | Chapels | Religious buildings | Buildings | Architecture
Periodicals | Publications | Communications media | Information sciences
Nonconformists
Nonconformity
Religion

Personal names

Corporate names
Warwick Gardens Methodist Chapel

Places
Kensington | London | England | UK | Western Europe | Europe
Kensington and Chelsea