Sara or Sarah Losh (1785 – 29 March 1853) was an English architect and designer. Her biographer describes her as an antiquarian, architect and visionary. She was a landowner of Wreay, Cumberland (now Cumbria), where her prime work, St Mary's Church, can be found. It anticipates the Arts and Crafts Movement and belongs to a group with buildings and monuments which Losh constructed.

Life and family

Losh's papers were destroyed and none of her journals or drawings survive, but her life is described in

Henry Lonsdale Henry Lonsdale M.D. (1816–1876) was an English physician, now known as a biographer. Early life Born in Carlisle, Cumberland, he was son of Henry Lonsdale, a tradesman there. After attending a local school he was apprenticed in 1831 to Messr ...

's ''The Worthies of Cumberland'', published by Routledge in six volumes in 1867–1875. She was born at Woodside in Wreay, near Carlisle, at an unknown date probably in late 1785, as she was baptised on 6 January 1786. She was the eldest of four children of John Losh (1756–1814) and his wife Isabella (née Bonner). Her father owned land in Woodside and was a partner with his brother William Losh in an alkali factory at

Walker Walker or The Walker may refer to: People * Walker (given name) *Walker (surname) * Walker (Brazilian footballer) (born 1982), Brazilian footballer Places In the United States *Walker, Arizona, in Yavapai County *Walker, Mono County, California ...

Tyneside Tyneside is a built-up area across the banks of the River Tyne in northern England. Residents of the area are commonly referred to as Geordies. The whole area is surrounded by the North East Green Belt. The population of Tyneside as publishe ...

, part of

Losh, Wilson and Bell Losh, Wilson and Bell, later Bells, Goodman, then Bells, Lightfoot and finally Bell Brothers, was a leading Northeast England manufacturing company, founded in 1809 by the partners William Losh, Thomas Wilson, and Thomas Bell. The firm was ...

. One of her brothers died young and another had mental disabilities, so that Sara and her sister Katherine became joint heirs of their father's estate. Neither married and Sara inherited Katherine's share on her death in 1835. Her uncle,

James Losh James Losh (1763–1833) was an English lawyer, reformer and Unitarian in Newcastle upon Tyne. In politics, he was a significant contact in the North East for the national Whig leadership. William Wordsworth the poet called Losh in a letter of 182 ...

, was a barrister in Newcastle, a prominent member of the city's

Literary and Philosophical Society The Literary and Philosophical Society of Newcastle upon Tyne (or the ''Lit & Phil'' as it is popularly known) is a historical library in Newcastle upon Tyne, England, and the largest independent library outside London. The library is still avai ...

, and friends with the poets

William Wordsworth William Wordsworth (7 April 177023 April 1850) was an English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their joint publication '' Lyrical Ballads'' (1798). Wordsworth's ' ...

Samuel Taylor Coleridge Samuel Taylor Coleridge (; 21 October 177225 July 1834) was an English poet, literary critic, philosopher, and theologian who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake ...

and

Robert Southey Robert Southey ( or ; 12 August 1774 – 21 March 1843) was an English poet of the Romantic school, and Poet Laureate from 1813 until his death. Like the other Lake Poets, William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Southey began as a ra ...

. Lonsdale calls Losh was well read and educated. She had been to schools in Wreay, London and Bath, and travelled in France, Italy and Germany in 1814 and 1817. She spoke fluent French and Italian and could translate Latin with ease. Lonsdale compared her mind to that of

George Eliot Mary Ann Evans (22 November 1819 – 22 December 1880; alternatively Mary Anne or Marian), known by her pen name George Eliot, was an English novelist, poet, journalist, translator, and one of the leading writers of the Victorian era. She wrot ...

. Although she never married, she may have been romantically attached to a schoolfriend, Major Thain, who was killed at the Khyber Pass in 1842. Sara Losh died at Woodside on 29 March 1853 and was buried in the churchyard of Wreay, where she shares a grave with her sister Katherine.

Architecture

Losh designed, funded and built several projects in and around Wreay from the late 1820s onwards. An example is a replica of

Bewcastle Cross The Bewcastle Cross is an Anglo-Saxon cross which is still in its original position within the churchyard of St Cuthbert's church at Bewcastle, in the English county of Cumbria. The cross, which probably dates from the 7th or early 8th century, ...

as a memorial to her parents, installed in 1835, and a schoolteacher's house at a villa in Pompeii. She also sunk wells and built village schools. By 1840, the old chapel at Wreay was in poor repair. Losh offered to grant the land and pay to replace it, provided she was given a free hand with its design. Permission was given by a faculty in May 1841. Losh based her design on an early Christian

basilica In Ancient Roman architecture, a basilica is a large public building with multiple functions, typically built alongside the town's Forum (Roman), forum. The basilica was in the Latin West equivalent to a stoa in the Greek East. The building ...

, with an

aisle An aisle is, in general, a space for walking with rows of non-walking spaces on both sides. Aisles with seating on both sides can be seen in airplanes, certain types of buildings, such as churches, cathedrals, synagogues, meeting halls, par ...

-less rectangular

nave The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-type ...

ending in a semicircular

apse In architecture, an apse (plural apses; from Latin 'arch, vault' from Ancient Greek 'arch'; sometimes written apsis, plural apsides) is a semicircular recess covered with a hemispherical vault or semi-dome, also known as an '' exedra''. ...

. She termed the style " early Saxon or modified Lombard". The apse has columns between spaces for 13 seats. The altar is a slab of Italian marble on brass eagles. The inside and outside surfaces are decorated with naturalistic stone carvings of fossils, plants and animals, many of them done by William Hindson, son of a local builder. Sara and her cousin William carved the font out of

alabaster Alabaster is a mineral or rock that is soft, often used for carving, and is processed for plaster powder. Archaeologists and the stone processing industry use the word differently from geologists. The former use it in a wider sense that include ...

. The results were compared by

Pevsner Pevsner or Pevzner is a Jewish surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Aihud Pevsner (1925–2018), American physicist * Antoine Pevsner (1886–1962), Russian sculptor, brother of Naum Gabo * David Pevsner, American actor, singer, da ...

to the arts and crafts workmanship of decades later. There are no explicitly Christian symbols, not even a cross, but the profusion of decoration has been seen by some as a celebration of creation. The church was completed at a cost of £1,200 and dedicated in December 1842. It is now a Grade II*

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

. The churchyard has a likewise Grade II listed mausoleum, built by Losh in 1850 in memory of her sister Katherine.Mausoleum listing. Retrieved 4 June 2020.
/ref> Losh also worked on restoring St John the Evangelist's Church, Newton Arlosh. File:St Mary's Church, Wreay - geograph.org.uk - 173963.jpg, St Mary's Church, Wreay File:St. Mary's Church Wreay, side view - geograph.org.uk - 561277.jpg, St Mary's Church, Wreay File:St. Mary's Church Wreay, altar and part of apse - geograph.org.uk - 561294.jpg, Altar and part of apse File:Churchyard of St Mary's, Wreay - geograph.org.uk - 561752.jpg, Replica of the

in the churchyard of St Mary's church, Wreay; the mausoleum of Katharine Losh is behind File:Gravestone of Katharine and Sarah Losh - geograph.org.uk - 561751.jpg, Gravestone of Katharine and Sarah Losh at St Mary's church, Wreay File:Interior of mausoleum , Wreay churchyard - geograph.org.uk - 561753.jpg, Mausoleum dedicated to Katharine Losh File:Wreay Church - window with insects and birds - geograph.org.uk - 561747.jpg, Stone window surround decorated with insects, birds and pinecones at St Mary's, Wreay File:Wreay Church - window surround with shells and pine cones - geograph.org.uk - 561740.jpg, Stone window surround decorated with fossils, plants and pinecones at St Mary's, Wreay File:Main Door, St Mary's Church, Wreay - geograph.org.uk - 174080.jpg, The main door of St Mary's Church, Wreay

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Losh, Sara 19th-century English architects 1785 births 1853 deaths Architects from Cumbria British women architects People from Cumberland