The Church of the Immaculate Conception is a historic church in Scarthingwell, in

North Yorkshire North Yorkshire is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in Northern England.The Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority areas of City of York, York and North Yorkshire (district), North Yorkshire are in Yorkshire and t ...

, in England. The church was constructed in 1854 to a design by

John Bownas and William Atkinson J. B. and W. Atkinson were English brothers who worked together as architects. John Bownas Atkinson (1807 – 1874) and William Atkinson (1811 – 1886) were the sons of the architect Peter Atkinson. They were born in York, and J.& ...

. It was commissioned by

Edward William Hawke-Harvey, 4th Baron Hawke Edward is an English male name. It is derived from the Anglo-Saxon name ''Ēadweard'', composed of the elements '' ēad'' "wealth, fortunate; prosperous" and '' weard'' "guardian, protector”. History The name Edward was very popular in Anglo-Sa ...

, as a private chapel for his seat, Scarthingwell Hall. It was the first church in England to be dedicated to the

Immaculate Conception The Immaculate Conception is the doctrine that the Virgin Mary was free of original sin from the moment of her conception. It is one of the four Mariology, Marian dogmas of the Catholic Church. Debated by medieval theologians, it was not def ...

. The hall was demolished in 1960, but the chapel survived as a

Roman Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics worldwide as of 2025. It is among the world's oldest and largest international institut ...

church. It was

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 ...

in 1988. The church is in the Norman style, built of limestone, with a slate roof. It has a nave with a

chancel In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar, including the Choir (architecture), choir and the sanctuary (sometimes called the presbytery), at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building. It may termi ...

in the form of an

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

. The west end is gabled, and houses four niches. There is also a small stone turret at the west end. The nave has four tall windows, each with two lights, while the chancel has seven

lancet window A lancet window is a tall, narrow window with a sharp pointed arch at its top. This arch may or may not be a steep lancet arch (in which the compass centres for drawing the arch fall outside the opening). It acquired the "lancet" name from its rese ...

s. Inside, there is highly decorative plasterwork and a wooden gallery at the west end, reached by a staircase, which originally housed the family pew, but now contains an organ.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Scarthingwell, Immaculate Conception Grade II listed churches in North Yorkshire Roman Catholic churches completed in 1854 Roman Catholic churches in North Yorkshire