On our way to Bewdley, in Worcestershire, (a week ago today, in fact), we stopped off at St Michael's, Tenbury Wells; that remarkable creation of the Rev Sir Arthur Gore Ousley, and the architect Henry Woodyer. I posted about the exterior here. An original and idiosyncratic riff on the Gothic style by a pupil of William Butterfield, who himself was no stranger to the idiosyncratic and the original. An unexpected, rather shrine like, rather urban object in the midst of a bucolic and remote part of England. Trusting in the internet, I believed we could finally get to have a look inside. I was wrong, thwarted, the church was closed.
Not wanting to disappoint you, approaching Bewdley, ahead of time, we made an unscheduled visit to the church of St Peter and St Paul, Rock. However, it was not to be our day, for it too was locked. The weather too had taken a turn from sunshine to overcast, blustery and cold. Still some photographs of the exterior of what is the one of the most important Romanesque churches in the county. It has been linked to the school of Herefordshire masons we have encountered before at Kilpeck and Leominster. That early work is largely confined to the n side of the nave and the chancel. The doorway, as you can see, is pretty grand, no money spared. The rest of the church was rebuilt in the later Middle Ages, when a s aisle was added to the nave and s chapel to the chancel and is not to be sniffed at. The tower is particularly fine. Sandstone, some nice textures. Church restored in 1861 by F Preedy.
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