The restoration of one of England’s most spectacular private chapels has been recognised at the prestigious Georgian Group architectural awards.
The group commended work by Soul Architects on the interior of the chapel of St Mary and St Everilda at Everingham, near Pocklington, East Yorkshire.
There were fears for the chapel’s survival when the Diocese of Middlesbrough surrendered the lease and closed the chapel in 2004. Its condition rapidly deteriorated with rainwater leaking through the lead roof damaging plasterwork.
But a new owner, Philip Guest, fought to save the Grade I listed building and the breakthrough came when the chapel won grants in 2020 and 2021 for urgent repairs to historic buildings in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.
At the awards ceremony at the Royal Institute of British Architects on 14 November, the chair of the judging panel and architectural editor of Country Life, Dr John Goodall, said: “The former Roman Catholic Chapel of St Mary the Virgin and St Everilda, built in 1836-9 by Agostino Giorgioli, sits in the park of Everingham Hall, Yorkshire. The relatively plain stuccoed exterior of this Grade I listed building belies its dramatic neo-classical interior with life-size statues of the Apostles by Luigi Bozzoni. Privately owned, the chapel is regularly opened to visitors and hosts musical events.
“A failing roof had allowed water to damage the interiors but two rounds of grant funding from the Historic Houses Foundation and the Culture Recovery Fund, made possible repairs including a new lead roof, parapet gutters and plasterwork conservation. A new colour scheme and renewed gilding better articulates the form of the ceiling.”
In his 2006 book on Catholic churches, A Glimpse of Heaven, Christopher Martin called the interior “one of the most powerful evocations of the ancient world in Britain”.
The chapel was built by William Constable Maxwell, Lord Herries, a member of a recusant family living in one of the most staunchly Catholic areas of England. His intention was to celebrate greater freedoms to practise the faith that came with the 1829 Roman Catholic Relief Act and to provide a place of worship for the villagers of Everingham. The chapel was dedicated to the Virgin Mary, St Everilda, a Saxon princess from Wessex who founded and ran a convent of 80 nuns at Everingham in the middle of the seventh century.
Mr Guest has said he hopes the restored chapel can be enjoyed by the local Catholic community.
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