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Description: Wesleyan Methodist Chapel

Address: Heptonstall Methodist Church Northgate Heptonstall Hebden Bridge West Yorkshire

Grade: IISTAR

Group detail: Northgate (east side) Heptonstall

Full description:
Chapel, c1764 to design recommended by John Wesley who laid the foundation stone, extended 1802. Watershot masonry, ashlar dressings, slate roof. 2 storeys. Irregular octagon originally built as symmetrical octagon. Chamfered plinth, rusticated quoins, band. Central doorway, now partly blocked to form a window with stained glass, has tall monolithic jambs, semi-circular arched head with moulded impost and triple keystone. Angled faces to either side have tall doorway with monolithic jambs and square fanlight. 1st floor has windows with plain stone surrounds and projecting sills with coloured glass margin panes. Longer sides have 2 similar windows to each floor. Tripartite hipped roof believed to be constructed by the same carpenter who had made the Rotherham Octagon (1761). Interior: Gallery with canted ends carried on stone Tuscan columns entablature has plaster cast of laurel leaves. Some box pews to main body, raked seating to gallery. Ministers tall pulpit with en-suite altar rails and small organ behind all contemporary with early C19 alteration. Octagonal plaster boss to ceiling. Some stained glass windows. Copper plaque (on outside) inscribed: "HEPTONSTALL METHODIST CHAPEL, THE OLDEST METHODIST CHAPEL, IN THE WORLD IN CONTINUOUS USE., THE SOCIETY WAS FOUNDED BY, WILLIAM DARNEY ABOUT 1742, THE REV. JOHN WESLEY PREACHED OUT, HEPTONSTALL FOR THE LAST TIME IN 1786". Illustrated in K. Parry, Trans-Pennine Heritage (1981) p.66; D. Linstrum, West Yorkshire, Architects and Architecture, (1978) p.197.