St Mary the Virgin, Brecon

St Mary’s is a Grade II* Church in Wales parish church on St Marys Street at the centre of old Brecon, Powys, in the Diocese of Swansea and Brecon: a medieval town church with an early sixteenth-century tower paid for by Edward Stafford, Duke of Buckingham.

Overview

Cadw lists the Church of St Mary (reference 7015, designated 16 January 1952) as a chapel of ease to the Benedictine Priory that became the parish church only in 1923, when the Priory was elevated to cathedral status. A scalloped capital in the nave indicates twelfth-century origins; extensions continued until the fourteenth century. The south porch is late fifteenth-century and retains its roof with arch-braces and a quatrefoil ceiling. In the early sixteenth century Edward Stafford, Duke of Buckingham, paid for the battlemented west tower of red sandstone with a north-west stair turret — called by the Buildings of Wales the finest in Powys and linked stylistically to the Perpendicular towers of Somerset. Repairs are recorded in 1805 and 1831. T. H. Wyatt restored the church in 1856–57. A new High Street entrance was made in 1889. From 1928 W. D. Caroe provided fixtures and fittings. Nave and chancel are in one, with aisles and arches of varied dates; mid-nineteenth-century open-truss wagon roofs survive.

The church is open daily, with level access to the main areas.

Further Information

• Cadw listed building 7015
• St Mary's Brecon