St Edmund, Rochdale
St Edmund, Rochdale
St Edmund’s on Edmund Street, Falinge, Rochdale, is a Grade I former parish church of 1870–73, now in the care of the Churches Conservation Trust.
- Location
- Rochdale, Lancashire
- Country
- England
- County
- Lancashire
- City / town
- Rochdale
- Address
- Edmund Street, Rochdale, Lancashire, OL12 6QF
- Postcode
- OL12 6QF
- Built
- 1870–73
- Architect
- James Medland Taylor and Henry Taylor, for Albert Hudson Royds
- Denomination
- Churches Conservation Trust
- Dedication
- Edmund
- Grade
- I
- Style
- Gothic Revival
- Materials
- Irregularly coursed sandstone rubble with bands of red sandstone, ashlar dressings and slate roofs
- Grid reference
- SD 891 138
- Opening hours
- Open every first & third Saturday 11am to 3pm (winter) and 11am to 4pm (summer). For private & group tours please contact us.
- Access
- Accessible toilets nearby. Level access to the main areas
Overview
Historic England records an Anglican church by the Manchester practice of James Medland Taylor and Henry Taylor, built for the banker and Freemason Albert Hudson Royds in memory of his parents. The fabric is irregularly coursed sandstone rubble with occasional bands of red sandstone, ashlar dressings and slate roofs, in a Gothic Revival manner with Arts and Crafts hints. The plan is a Latin cross with a large square crossing tower, a short aiseless nave, wide transepts, chancel, Royds chapel and vestry. The interior is organised as a series of cubes; polished granite columns appear to carry the crossing tower.
Pevsner called it Rochdale’s temple to Freemasonry. Masonic geometry and imagery run through the fittings: a lectern with craft tools, stained glass by Lavers, Barraud and Westlake that includes the Building of the Temple, a vine reredos by Thomas Earp, and a white marble font of 1871. The church closed in 2007, was raised from Grade II* to Grade I in 2010, and is now conserved by the Trust.