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Report - - Arnsheen Church, Barrhill - September 2017 | Other Sites | 28DaysLater.co.uk

Report - Arnsheen Church, Barrhill - September 2017

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Idle Hands

28DL Full Member
28DL Full Member
Arnsheen Church

I've not seen a report on this and it made for a nice enough stop-off, so if churches are your thing, fill your boots...

Arnsheen Church was designed by Scottish architect and RIBA associate Robert Samson Ingram, though it seems his RIBA membership had lapsed a few years before this building was completed in 1887. A fair number of Ayrshire’s schools, buildings and castles bear his name, but he was particularly prolific in designing churches for all denominations. The Roman Catholic archdiocese of Glasgow appears to have been a particularly important client around this time.

Stylistically versatile, this particular example of his work was built in the Scottish Baronial style and is cruciform in shape, asymmetrical with a clock tower to one corner. It’s the tower that catches your eye now and grabs your attention through the trees: the whole site has otherwise succumbed to rampant undergrowth since it closed as a church in 2002 - which is generally a welcome invitation to take a closer look at what might be shrouded within.

Planning permission was granted to convert it in to residential accommodation back in 2003, and it was category C Listed in 2010. For the most part it seems to be weather-tight. Which certainly made for a welcome respite from the relentless rainfall outside…

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It's been mostly stripped on the inside but there are a few nice features left, leaded lights almost all in tact (save for the window a tree has fallen through), decorative pulpit and organ housing...

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Plus another much more recent organ...

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The exposed timber roof shows off the kind of craftsmanship that you seldom see these days...

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The vestry hasn't weathered quite so well...

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The main entrance lobby seems to be in fairly good repair on first glance...

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...until you see that the upper floors of the tower have collapsed in to it...

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There's some more nice detailing in the stone spiral staircase, with leaded lights heading up it until it becomes unpassable.

I think the clock and bell are still up there, but from this level all you see are broken wires...

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Shame I couldn't get any higher to investigate but not a bad way to spend half an hour for all that.

Thanks for looking :thumb
 
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