St Brigid's Church is a

heritage-listed This list is of heritage registers, inventories of cultural properties, natural and human-made, tangible and intangible, movable and immovable, that are deemed to be of sufficient heritage value to be separately identified and recorded. In ma ...

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 Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a place/building for Christian religious activities and praying * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian comm ...

located at 78 Musgrave Road, Red Hill,

City of Brisbane The City of Brisbane is a local government area (LGA) which comprises the inner portion of Greater Brisbane, the capital of Queensland, Australia. Its governing body is the Brisbane City Council. The LGAs in the other mainland state capitals ...

Queensland Queensland ( , commonly abbreviated as Qld) is a States and territories of Australia, state in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Austr ...

, Australia. It was designed by

Robin Dods Robert Smith (Robin) Dods (9 June 1868 – 23 July 1920) was a New Zealand-born Australian architect. Personal life Dods was born in Dunedin, New Zealand on 9 June 1868. His parents were Robert Smith Dods (a wholesale grocer) and Elizabeth Gray ...

and built from 1912 to 1914 by Thomas Keenan. It was added to the

Queensland Heritage Register The Queensland Heritage Register is a heritage register, a statutory list of places in Queensland, Australia that are protected by Queensland legislation, the Queensland Heritage Act 1992. It is maintained by the Queensland Heritage Council. As ...

on 21 October 1992.

History

The original St Brigid's Red Hill church was blessed and opened on 30 December 1882. It replaced an earlier stone structure built in 1877. As the parish grew to be one of the largest in Brisbane, a larger church was needed to accommodate 1000 people. The current Church's foundation stone was laid on 5 May 1912 and it was built from 1912 to 1914. The parish was largely composed of poor Irish immigrants so that the church became a focal point of the Irish Catholic cause in Queensland.

Opening ceremony

The church was dedicated and opened on 9 August 1914. The opening ceremony was a significant occasion in the life of the Catholic community in Brisbane, attended by Archbishop of Melbourne

Daniel Mannix Daniel Patrick Mannix (4 March 1864 – 6 November 1963) was an Irish-born Australian Catholic bishop. Mannix was the Archbishop of Melbourne for 46 years and one of the most influential public figures in 20th-century Australia. Early lif ...

and presided over by Archbishop of Brisbane

James Duhig Sir James Duhig KCMG (2 September 187110 April 1965) was an Irish-born Australian Roman Catholic religious leader. He was the Archbishop of Brisbane for 48 years from 1917 until his death in 1965. At the time of his death he was the longest- ...

. The construction of St Brigid's was regarded as the coming of age of Catholicism in Brisbane. For Duhig, who was to become renowned as a prolific builder of churches and schools, St Brigid's was an auspicious beginning.

School

The St Brigid's School no longer operates. The nearest school is the Petrie Terrace State School down the hill to the south in Paddington.

Current use

St Brigid's Church is part of the Jubilee Catholic Parish including seven churches and three schools in the inner western suburbs of Brisbane.

Parish newsletter

Newsletters for the Jubilee Parish provide contact details and further information on the Parish.

Description

Position

St Brigid's Church is significant as it is an icon on the inner Brisbane skyline, visible from all directions. The church is prominently situated high on Red Hill, unconventionally oriented north-south, to terminate the vista along George Street (the view had been lost with the construction of the

Brisbane Transit Centre The Brisbane Transit Centre, at 151–171 Roma Street, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, was a long-distance bus station. It was closed and demolished in 2020 along with its three office towers. It was commonly regarded as the ugliest building ...

but has been restored with the 2020 demolition of the Transit Centre). Its hilltop position, close to the city centre, makes it a Brisbane landmark. St Brigid's Church is significant as an example of Archbishop Duhig's efforts to place churches in prominent positions throughout Brisbane, and as a symbol of the emerging confidence of Catholicism in Queensland which was dominated by Irish immigrants at the time.

Architecture

It is a brick fortress-like building, rectangular, with the

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 ...

, entrance

porch A porch (; , ) is a room or gallery located in front of an entrance to a building. A porch is placed in front of the façade of a building it commands, and forms a low front. Alternatively, it may be a vestibule (architecture), vestibule (a s ...

and its flanking

buttress A buttress is an architectural structure built against or projecting from a wall which serves to support or reinforce the wall. Buttresses are fairly common on more ancient (typically Gothic) buildings, as a means of providing support to act ...

es semi-octagonal in shape. A single-storeyed

vestry A vestry was a committee for the local secular and ecclesiastical government of a parish in England, Wales and some English colony, English colonies. At their height, the vestries were the only form of local government in many places and spen ...

protrudes off the west side of the chancel. A single-storeyed vestry protrudes off the west side of the chancel. Its design by Robert Smith Dods (commonly known as Robin S. Dods) was inspired by St Ceciles Cathedral at

Albi Albi (; ) is a commune in France, commune in southern France. It is the prefecture of the Tarn (department), Tarn Departments of France, department, on the river Tarn (river), Tarn, 85 km northeast of Toulouse. Its inhabitants are called ...

, France, which the parish building committee had chosen as the model for St Brigid's. It is an outstanding example, both internally and externally, of the architecture of Robin Dods, It reflects the influence of some of the design theories current in Europe during Dods's early career in

Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...

, in particular 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 ...

use of materials and the picturesque approach to landscape and siting. Many features of the building, including the high proportions, opening windows with

balconies A balcony (from , "scaffold") is a platform projecting from the wall of a building, supported by columns or console brackets, and enclosed with a balustrade, usually above the ground floor. They are commonly found on multi-level houses, apartme ...

, arches,

French doors A door is a hinged or otherwise movable barrier that allows ingress (entry) into and egress (exit) from an enclosure. The created opening in the wall is a ''doorway'' or ''portal''. A door's essential and primary purpose is to provide securit ...

, and the open chancel area, contribute to a cool environment. The original plan included a

tower A tower is a tall Nonbuilding structure, structure, taller than it is wide, often by a significant factor. Towers are distinguished from guyed mast, masts by their lack of guy-wires and are therefore, along with tall buildings, self-supporting ...

above the chancel but this was not built for lack of funds. LJ Harvey's life size statue of St Brigid above the entrance porch, holds a model of the completed church.

Interior

The interior of St Brigid's is austere and simple in decoration yet grand in dimensions. The detailing and workmanship in brick, stone, wood, glass and metal are austere but refined. Notable features include the timber ceiling, light fittings, gallery, organ, altars and stained glass. However, the original silky oak and leadlight doors running the length of the nave on the east and west walls, and some other fixed glazing, have been replaced with fully glazed areas which allow excessive light into the interior at floor level.

Pipe organ

St Brigid's contains a recently renovated pipe organ in the choir loft that fills the church.

Heritage listing

St Brigid's Church was listed on the

on 21 October 1992 having satisfied the following criteria. The place is important in demonstrating the evolution or pattern of Queensland's history. St Brigid's Church is significant as an example of Duhig's efforts to place churches in prominent positions throughout Brisbane and as a symbol of the emerging confidence of Catholicism in Queensland which was dominated by Irish immigrants at the time. The place is important in demonstrating the principal characteristics of a particular class of cultural places. St Brigid's Church is significant as a characteristic part of the inner Brisbane skyline, visible from all directions. It is an outstanding example, both internally and externally, of the architecture of Robin Dods, a recognised member of the contemporary Arts and Crafts movement in Europe and the United States of America. The place is important because of its aesthetic significance. St Brigid's Church is significant as a self-conscious townscape composition designed to place an acropolis-like skyline on the axis of George Street and for the impressive quality of the interior which is derived from the carefully considered combination of materials, light and scale.

References

Attribution

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Brigids Church Red Hill Queensland Heritage Register Red Hill, Queensland Roman Catholic churches in Brisbane Defunct schools in Queensland Articles incorporating text from the Queensland Heritage Register 1914 establishments in Australia 20th-century Roman Catholic church buildings in Australia Roman Catholic churches completed in 1914 Arts and Crafts architecture in Australia