Abney Park Chapel - The Blending of Styles

The Blending of Styles

To celebrate its unique message of religious harmony, the chapel was to be a blend of conventional and unique characteristics. William Hosking drafted and redrafted an increasingly elegant solution to this design problem, beginning from a fairly conventional, scaled-down version of an Anglican gothic minster as a convenient starting point.

The design of the chapel was to evolve considerably from this initial starting point. It was a somewhat unusual starting point in some respects in that nonconformists, such as the cemetery directors, generally preferred classical designs over gothic revival. It was not until some years later this style was to become popular with nonconformists, whose interest lay purely in its aesthetics. At this date nonconformist clients did not commission the gothic revival style, due to pressure to closely associate it with 'high church' uses, as was advocated by some early revivalist architects led by Pugin. By the time a chapel was built at Mount Auburn in Massachusetts, a few years after Abney Park's Chapel, the gothic (pointed) style was more commonly accepted by nonconformists.

However, in the early Gothic revivalist period of 1838-40, when the chapel for Abney Park was designed, the use of the gothic style would certainly have conveyed a 'high church' note in conventional architectural circles. This implies that Collison and Hosking may have used the style as a deliberate architectural counterpoise to what some critics saw as their 'non western' or 'non Christian' style of entranceway ('Egyptian Revival'). Those who interpreted the chapel's gothic affiliations in this contemporary way, might therefore have considered the chapel to contribute 'balance' to the cemetery's entrance ensemble, underpinning the cemetery company's overall philosophy of nondenominational harmony, and reflecting the ecumenical leanings of Isaac Watts who had lived at the parkland estate a century before.

Gradually, in the later Victorian period, adoption of 'gothic' designs came to suggest an association with nature, rather than with western Christian architecture. Although such associations primarily emerged in the mid-late Victorian 'arts and crafts' period, it is possible that the association with 'nature' and the 'natural world' was an influence on Hosking's design since the overall cemetery project was conceived as a splendid botanical extravaganza, with the largest arboretum in the country, perfected by the famous George Loddiges.

Whatever the explanation, Hosking's Abney Park Chapel was designed in a form of 'gothic revival' style, which for such an early date is believed to be the earliest example of 'gothic revival' architecture for a stand-alone or unconsecrated chapel.

Being earlier than the mainstream use of 'gothic revival' designs for chapel architecture, and in all probability with the express intention of weakening the all too frequent association of gothic with 'high church' buildings, which was being advocated rather pompously by Augustus Pugin junior, a distinctly 'low gothic revivalist' style was gradually developed by Hosking and his clients, from a conventional gothic 'mister-like' starting point. Hosking was successful in producing a unique and careful interpretation of the gothic style which was well-suited to the 'low church sentiments' of his clients. For example, stock brick rather than traditional stone was used for much of the exterior, introducing a visual quality similar to the Brick Gothic style of Baltic countries, Sweden, Estonia etc. Moreover, neo-classical features (i.e. semi-circular arches) were carefully composited into the horse carriage entrance (porte cochere), and each viewing turret bore a simple romanesque oculus to let light onto its newel staircase, rather than a pointed or quatrefoil gothic window or an oculus whose aperture was in the gothic style.

The concept of introducing classical elements into a gothic design had previously used in England only on rare occasions, such as for the Little Castle at Bolsover in Derbyshire, built after the Reformation, from 1612. It symbolised a connection with Romanesque-Gothic religious buildings of continental Europe, such as the monastic basilica of St. Procopius, Trebic, Czech Republic, where Jewish and Christian cultures co-existed; now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Hosking's search for a thoughtful and appropriate design for the three rose windows of the chapel, may also have been influenced partly by the St. Procopius basilica which incorporates a rare example of the use of a naturalistic ten-part rose window. All wild roses have five petals and five sepals or multiples of this number, as do theor fruit. Similarly a lime, orange or lemon which belong to the Roseaceae family will also normally show ten fruit segments, as can be seen if cut in half. The adoption of a botanical rose window introduced an element of classical learning and reason rather than the tendency of gothic towards the more elaborate and supernatural. Its choice would also have suited the horticulturalist and scientist George Loddiges who was on the design team for he saw the hand of the Creator in the beautiful natural designs of botanical species and varieties. His multi-part work, 'The Botanical Cabinet' took a distinctly more religious view of botany than competitor's illustrated works such as Curtis' 'Botanical Magazine' and was noted for its piety. Near to the chapel with its splendid botanical rose windows George Loddiges laid out a special rosarium to bring attention to this rich and diverse plan family. The botanical rose windows would also have suited George Collison for his ancestral town was Beverley in Yorkshire, where he would have been familiar with the widespread use of the White Rose of York as a symbol and have seen it reproduced, taking up the theme of the rose, in the rare ten-part botanical rose windows of Beverley Minster.

Ultimately the botanical rose windows at the Abney Park Chapel provided a strong symbolic detail that dovetailed the chapel to the design of the grounds and its rosarium, besides offering the beauty of simplicity and a compliment to the Creator; a design of considerable thoughtfulness as came to typify William Hosking's learned and historical approach to architecture.

For the pointed gothic windows, grouped in threes, no tracery was used, also representing careful thinking about simplicity of design. For the steeple, William Hosking drew on the fourteenth century Bloxham church in Oxfordshire for design inspiration. Its steeple, the tallest in the county, is octagonal in cross-section and gains additional elevation from a raised octaganal base with a decorated rim; and the spire itself is of graceful, elegant simplicity unlike more ornate gothic steeples with buttresses and decorative crockets. These low Gothic characteristics suited Hosking's purpose well, though he added a flourish of colour banding to the steeple - a Victorian fashion.

The final result was a chapel, complete with its unornamented yellow stock brick walls, a tall, eye-catching yet gracefully simple steeple, and simple botanically accurate rose windows, created a dramatic but tasteful and purposeful piece; one that epitomised its low gothic nondenominational function well, whilst establishing Abney Park as a local landmark visible from the thoroughfares of Church Street and the High Street, and from Woodberry Downs in the middle distance.