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© Miss Esther Harbour

IoE Number: 479523
Location: CHURCH OF ST JOHN THE EVANGELIST, CARLTON HILL (north side)
  BRIGHTON, BRIGHTON AND HOVE, EAST SUSSEX
Photographer: Miss Esther Harbour
Date Photographed: 03 August 2005
Date listed: 20 August 1971
Date of last amendment: 20 August 1971
Grade II

BRIGHTON TQ3104SE CARLTON HILL 577-1/41/109 (North side) 20/08/71 Church of St John the Evangelist II Anglican church. 1838-1840. Designed by George Cheeseman Junior for the Rev. Henry Michell Wagner; builders, George Cheeseman and Son. Altered and restored by LA Mackintosh in 1957; since 1986 it has been used by Carlton Hill Greek Orthodox church. Stone, painted brick in Flemish bond, stucco cement. Gable-facing roof, hipped to the north. PLAN: although the elevation suggests that the church is planned on a north-south axis, the axis of the square nave is, in fact, west-east, with a shallow, rectangular chancel recess to the east. Vestry to ritual south-east corner. U-shaped gallery to nave is entered through square vestibules containing stairs to the galleries. Greek Revival style. EXTERIOR: facade of ritual west end divided into 3 bays by 4 giant Tuscan pilasters which support a massive entablature with triglyph and metope frieze; the centre bay of the facade is wider than the ends and recessed, with flat-arched entrances on its returns; above the centre bay is plain pediment with gable coping. There is a metal cross to peak of pediment and a bell cote behind. To either side of the centre recess is a flat-arched entrance with a wide lintel treated as an entablature having a triglyph and metope frieze; this entrance is set into an aedicule consisting of a pair of fluted Tuscan pilasters, entablature, and pediment with raking cornice, all executed in stucco cement. Above each aedicule is a roundel, the left with the monogram topped by a crown, mark of the architect LA Mackintosh; the right bears the symbol of the dedication saint, the eagle; both roundels in white on a blue field. Side walls and rear in purplish-brown brick laid in English bond; tall camber-arched windows with gauged brick lintels light the nave and gallery. Single-storey vestry off right return articulated by Tuscan pilastrade. Stone at foot of right return reads: "This Corner Stone placed on October 15th, 1838. [obscured] M. Wagner. Architect [obscured]" INTERIOR: entrance to chancel, which is now partly obscured by Greek iconostasis, flat arched through antae supporting an entablature. Wood reredos built as memorial to 1914-1918 war: panelled with pilasters of Composite order, segmental pediment over centre. Gallery around 3 sides supported on 10 cast-iron Doric columns; responds to the east wall; gallery fronts treated as plain entablature with parapet. The broadly splayed windows are bisected by the galleries and filled with opaque glass. The plain walls terminate in an entablature with broad soffit. The flat ceiling is divided into 9 panels by broad, shallow beams; the centre panel is the largest and ornamented with an octagonal pattern; the remaining ones are subdivided into geometric figures. The nave benches, which date from the mid to late C19, are arranged so as to form a centre and side aisles. At the north-east corner of the nave a wood pulpit of mid C19 and opposite the chancel under the gallery is an 8-sided stone baptismal font with wood cover and wrought-iron rail: the latter 2 features are in the Gothic Revival style. The organ is located in the centre of the west gallery. In front of it, fixed to a railing, are the Royal Arms. Memorial plaques of note include: Sophia Jackson, ob. 1845, and Caroline Drummond, ob. 1868 both on west wall; on north wall to Laetitia Tilbury Tarner, who lived in nearby Tilbury Place. (Carder T: The Encyclopaedia of Brighton: Lewes: 1990-: 30; Dale A and Wagner A: The Wagners of Brighton: London/Chichester: 1983-: 52-53; Guide to the Parish Church of Saint John the Evangelist: Brighton).