Central Methodist Church, Lincoln (formerly known as Portland Place Methodist Church) is a

Grade II listed In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, H ...

Methodist church Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a Protestant Christianity, Christian Christian tradition, tradition whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's brother ...

in the city of Lincoln in

Lincolnshire Lincolnshire (), abbreviated ''Lincs'', is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the East Midlands and Yorkshire and the Humber regions of England. It is bordered by the East Riding of Yorkshire across the Humber estuary to th ...

, England. It is an active place of worship in the

Boultham Boultham () is an inner-city and Wards of the United Kingdom, ward of Lincoln, England, Lincoln in Lincolnshire, England. The population of the City of Lincoln ward at the 2021 census was 11,258 this included the areas of New Boultham and Swanpo ...

area of the city near St Peter at Gowts church. The High Street face is in the Edwardian Baroque style, in red brick and limestone

ashlar Ashlar () is a cut and dressed rock (geology), stone, worked using a chisel to achieve a specific form, typically rectangular in shape. The term can also refer to a structure built from such stones. Ashlar is the finest stone masonry unit, a ...

, with two unequal towers topped with domes.

History

The church was built in 1905. The architects were the

Leeds Leeds is a city in West Yorkshire, England. It is the largest settlement in Yorkshire and the administrative centre of the City of Leeds Metropolitan Borough, which is the second most populous district in the United Kingdom. It is built aro ...

-based firm, Howdill & Sons (Thomas Howdill and his son, Charles Barker Howdill), who designed many Primitive Methodist chapels. It originally opened as Portland Place Methodist Church or Portland Place Memorial Chapel. The original congregation was Primitive Methodist. There was originally a Sunday School, meeting rooms and theatre to the rear. The name changed to the present one in 1932. Some of the interior furnishings, including the pulpit, were changed in 1968. The church was given Grade II listed building status in 1999.

Description

The building's architectural style is given as "eclectic Edwardian Baroque" in its listing. Nicholas Antram, in his revised volume ''Lincolnshire'', in the Pevsner Buildings of England series, notes the building materials and also comments on the style, "brick and much stone...with a great deal of rustication". He also records the

Arts and Crafts The Arts and Crafts movement was an international trend in the Decorative arts, decorative and fine arts that developed earliest and most fully in the British Isles and subsequently spread across the British Empire and to the rest of Europe and ...

influences on the building's tower. The rectangular building is in red brick and

limestone, which the listing considers could be

Lincolnshire limestone The Lincolnshire Limestone Formation is a geological formation in England, part of the Inferior Oolite Group of the ( Bajocian) Middle Jurassic strata of eastern England. It was formed around 170 million years ago, in a shallow, warm sea on the ...

; the main roofs are of slate, with the towers have lead roofs. The chapel forms the east part facing the High Street, with the Sunday School and associated rooms at the rear (west). The High Street front has two main storeys, with square towers rising to each side. The ground floor is in stone, while the upper storeys (including the towers) are in brick with stone dressings; in both cases the stone is grooved. The left (south) tower is substantially the taller of the two; it has an octagonal top section capped by a dome, which is surmounted by a

finial A finial () or hip-knob is an element marking the top or end of some object, often formed to be a decorative feature. In architecture, it is a small decorative device, employed to emphasize the Apex (geometry), apex of a dome, spire, tower, roo ...

. The right (north) tower has a lead-covered top section with a square dome. Both towers have a ground-floor entrance and grooved stone

quoin Quoins ( or ) are masonry blocks at the corner of a wall. Some are structural, providing strength for a wall made with inferior stone or rubble, while others merely add aesthetic detail to a corner. According to one 19th-century encyclopedia, ...

s. The central section (between the towers) is set back from the street, with three arched entrances with keystones on the ground floor, which have elliptical

cartouches file:Birth and Throne cartouches of pharaoh Seti I, from KV17 at the Valley of the Kings, Egypt. Neues Museum.jpg, upalt=A stone face carved with coloured hieroglyphics. Two cartouches - ovoid shapes with hieroglyphics inside - are visible at the ...

between them, one of which bears the inscription "PORTLAND PLACE MEMORIAL 1906". The first floor has a large central window with "1905" inscribed above it, with doubled columns on either side, and two smaller windows with keystones, with single columns flanking. The central recessed section is surmounted by a

pediment Pediments are a form of gable in classical architecture, usually of a triangular shape. Pediments are placed above the horizontal structure of the cornice (an elaborated lintel), or entablature if supported by columns.Summerson, 130 In an ...

containing a semi-circular window. The north and south faces are much less decorated, and have five windows to each storey. There is a further gabled wing at the rear housing the Sunday School and other rooms.

Functions

The church holds religious services, and community events, and has a shop, the "Lincoln Community Grocery".

References

Sources

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Lincoln Central Methodist Church Church of England church buildings in Lincolnshire Grade II listed churches in Lincolnshire Central Methodist Church