Church of St Christopher Moorgate Avenue/Minehead Avenue Withington

Consecrated       14 December 1935 by Dr Guy Warman, Bishop of Manchester

The parish was created in 1932 to serve the people on the Old Moat Estate which was then in the process of construction.  Within the Withington Deanery it was carved out of the parish of Christ Church, West Didsbury, to the south and St. Paul Withington to the east. By February 1932 provisional plans for a church, parish hall and rectory occupying three sides of a central courtyard had been prepared by Bernard Miller and approved by the Bishop’s Advisory Committee.

A NEW CHURCH IN MANCHESTER – Mr Bernard Miller, whose two modern churches of St Christopher and St Columba at Liverpool have become pilgrimage churches for young architects from all parts of the country, is now building a new church at Withington. It promises to be a church as full of interesting new forms and new materials as either of his Liverpool ones, yet like them, very solemn and reverent and with those touches of grace and beauty in the detail which always distinguish the work of this architect. The chief difference is that the size and site of this Manchester church have given him the opportunity for a more monumental conception. The church closes the axis of Moorgate Avenue, a secondary road off Princess Road, the main arterial route between Manchester and Wythenshawe, and it will serve in its parish a new housing area of 10,000 persons. The architect has placed the long axis of his church across this approach road, and by planning the church hall and his vicarage in flanking positions at right angles to the church has not only formed an interesting group of buildings but has given to his main building the dignity of a forecourt. This he has further enhanced by placing his tower central on this court and by making his approach, already planted with poplars, direct to a porch at its foot. In his tower too he has made a great recess above this entrance, filled with a lofty window, in front of which, seen from the inside as well as the out, will stand, using the porch as a pedestal, an impressive piece of sculpture. Everything, therefore, has been done to emphasise the solemnity of the axial approach. The interior is a long solemn nave from end to end, constructed as a reinforced concrete frame faced internally and externally with brick. The main piers are planned at frequent intervals to spread the weight of the building evenly over a foundation the nature of which calls for such an arrangement: the concrete construction has been turned to account in the design. It has determined the form of the ceiling, which is also the roof, and one feels it is the almost necessary flatness of this which in turn has determined the generally monumental character of the design. The effect of the concrete also appears in some of the detail, such as the web-like tracery of the windows and the belfry. The interior is surrounded by a low ambulatory giving scale to the lofty walls and to the semi-circular baptistery with its seven tall slender windows opposite the tower entrance. There is no chancel arch, but it is hoped to mark off the sanctuary by a slight silver screen carrying figures, a light and graceful thing very typical of the architect. This screen seems necessary to give the aerial perspective so monumental an interior calls for. It is hoped that the corporation of Manchester when they realise the dignity of this group of buildings will leave the two corner plots of land between the buildings and Minehead Avenue unbuilt on. They should be shaven lawns like those of the forecourt to do justice to the long elegant lines of the main structure. [Professor C H Reilly Manchester Guardian 29 March 1935 page 9]

THE BUILDING OF ST CHRISTOPHER’S – The Church of St Christopher at Withington, of which the Bishop laid the foundation stone in March and which will serve one of the biggest municipally developed suburbs, is now so far built that its walls run level with the roof-tops of neighbouring houses. It is being disclosed, as Professor C H Reilly wrote earlier in the year in these columns, as a building having “touches of grace and beauty.” The church authorities have now approved the paintings which Miss Mary Adshead, the artist, has made for the reredos. The church which is designed by Mr Bernard Miller, the architect of two distinguished modern churches in Liverpool, is to have a large reredos on canvas panels in wooden mouldings occupying the east wall behind the altar. The main panel depicts the Ascension, and a number of smaller panels on either side illustrate scenes in the life of Christ. [Manchester Guardian 13 August 1935 page 11]

ST CHRISTOPHER’S WITHINGTON – Mr Bernard Miller’s new church of St Christopher’s Withington, is nearly finished and is to be consecrated on December 14. This church, which is conspicuous during daylight by the concrete grilles of the bell tower and at night by the blue neon light which outlines the concrete cross is unusual in other things. It is, like a number of other new Manchester churches, remarkable because it is specifically designed for this age, and relies on its own design and decoration to produce the emotion of reverence, rather than on forms which have been commonly used because they are supposed to arouse that emotion. Entering St Christopher’s now, under the great window which some day is to contain a stone figure, one is surprised by the amount of light which flows into the church. The seven tall windows in the semi-circular baptistery front the main door, and the nave is lit by a large opening in the end wall and by the narrow concrete-headed windows in the long walls which are conspicuous in the exterior view. The walls are of brick, colour- washed yellow, and the ceiling, seen between the concrete beams of the flat roof, is painted in shades of blue with green, and a red fillet. Blue curtains 35 feet long, are to be hung at the sides of the altar-piece which Miss Adshead is painting. The low ambulatory and side chapel have electric ceiling lights, the nave has wall brackets with pink glass, and the sanctuary is lit by floodlights in the window openings. [Manchester Guardian 27 November 1935 page 13]

A NEW MANCHESTER CHURCH - The new church of St Christopher at Withington which is to consecrated by the Bishop of Manchester to-day, is the first in the diocese to be built with money raised as a result of the Bishop's recent appeal for £50.000 for new churches; It is situated in the midst of over 2,600 houses. most of which have been built by the Manchester Corporation during the past ten years. The estate. with its population of 10,000, has from its early days had its council schools and its shops, but St. Christopher's is the estate's first permanent church. The parish came into existence just under four years ago, and the building of the new church began on Armistice Day, last year.  It has cost £11, 500, and about three-quarters of this sum has already been raised by donations and grants. There is, however, still a debt of £700 on the land, and a permanent parish hall is now an urgent necessity. For this there are at present no funds. The ideal by which both the architect. Mr B A Miller, and the rector, the Rev Ronald Allen, have been guided is that the new church should in its frankly modern design represent Christianity as a living religion and in its commanding position become B real centre of the com- munity where people may meet not only for worship and religious teaching but also for the purpose of making personal friendships. It in fact hope% that the church will serve the same purpose as do the churches in country villages. Most of the houses in the parish are new and the population has been drawn from many parts. A large number of the parishioners have recently left the slums. There is amongst them a good deal of poverty and distress. and often little friendliness or neighbourliness. [Manchester Guardian 14 December 1935 page 11].

Reference    Manchester Guardian 20 February 1932 page 13 letter
Reference    Builder 5 October 1934 Page 603
Reference    Builder 23 November 1934 Page 919 - tenders
Reference    Manchester Guardian 29 March 1935 page 9 – Professor Reilly
Reference    Manchester Guardian 29 March 1935 page 9 – Drawings by Bernard Miller
Reference    Manchester Guardian 13 August 1935 page 11 – In Manchester
Reference    Manchester Guardian 27 November 1935 page 13 – In Manchester
Reference    Manchester Guardian 14 December 1935 page 11with illustration of reredos
Reference    Manchester Guardian 16 December 1935 page 12 – consecration service
Reference    Manchester Guardian 20 December 1935 page 13 – letter from Rev Ronald Allen