St Mary's is thought to be the first post-Reformation Catholic Church to have been built as a…read morechurch (as opposed to an adapted building) since the Reformation. It has had an interesting if rather chequered history, and is known as the 'Hidden Gem'.
History
The church was commissioned in 1792 by Father Broomhead, then priest at a small chapel dedicated to St Chad, to serve what was in the 1790s a rapidly expanding but poor area of Manchester. The church was completed in 1794. This first building was re-roofed in 1833, at the behest of the incumbent Father Henry Gillow, but the work was done poorly, and the roof collapsed just two years later, taking much of the rest of the building with it. Father Gillow himself died of typhus in 1837, so a decision was taken to rebuild the church on the existing site, and it is this we see today.
The church was designed by the architectural partnership of John Grey Weightman (1801-1872) and Matthew Ellison Hadfield (1812-1885). The term the 'Hidden gem' was coined by Herbert Vaughan, the second Catholic Bishop of Salford, appointed in 1872, who said, "No matter on what side of the church you look, you behold a hidden gem".
The church
Although no longer surrounded by slums, the commercial architecture around the building still rather crowds it, and it still feels very much in a back street. In particular, it is not possible to get a good view of the front façade, which can be accessed via a low but wide passageway from the square in Brazennose Street, as well as along Mulberry Street.
The exterior is in the Romanesque style, executed in red brick with sandstone dressings. The most prominent feature is the tower, of three stages topped with a "Rhenish Helm" spire, but the main stone entrance portal, of two orders in the Romanesque style and with a carved tympanum, is perhaps the most attractive feature.
Inside, the interior is compact and darkly atmospheric: the short nave has arcades of 6 bays of narrow rounded arches, supported on marbled columns with elaborately carved capitals, each different. The nave roof is broken to form a high cupola, which provides most of the light. However, attention is drawn to the elaborate reredos of Caen stone, which almost fills the Sanctuary. It is carved with Saints and angels, and decorated with columns, roundels and inlay of green, dark brown and yellow marble. There are chapels to the left and right of the sanctuary, at the east end of the aisles.
The rest of the interior is whitewashed, but the aisle walls are covered by vibrantly painted Stations of the Cross, commissioned from Norman Adams RA and installed in 1995. They have received much critical acclaim from the artistic world, although they are very different in style from the rest of the church's decoration, and for some visitors are something of an acquired taste.
The church today is the centre of a very busy and active city centre ministry: it's website proudly proclaims: "The attendance at daily Mass is uniformly excellent".
