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Summary

Description

Speirs and Company, 1905 (relocated 1923). Single storey, rectangular-plan, corrugated-iron church with timber frame and pitched roof. Pointed-arch windows. Gabled vestibule projecting to S with window to S; timber boarded door to W; lean-to WC addition to E. Octagonal window above vestibule with timber cross at gable apex. Lean-to vestry outshot to NE corner. Triangular window to N (Sanctuary) gable with amber-coloured glass. Corrugated-iron and timber gables painted green; white painted fenestration.

Timber-framed, 6-pane astragalled timber windows; cast-iron rainwater goods.

INTERIOR: good interior scheme lined throughout with boarded pine; kingpost roof structure with text on beam above sanctuary: 'In this place will I give peace'. Many elements surviving fire of 1953N (see Notes) including: carved oak altar with amber-coloured glass window above; timber canopy (1938); pulpit on raised platform to E; decorative stone font to S; timber congregational chairs; carved War Memorial and 1934 monument to church's principal founders by Hew Lorimer. Good furnishings. Timber panelled doors.

Statement of Special Interest

Place of worship in use as such. St Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church is a good example of a corrugated iron church in the East Neuk area. These buildings more commonly survive in the Highlands and Islands and this Fife example is therefore particularly rare.

The church is representative of the early 20th century work of the Speirs and Company iron foundry who were Glasgow's foremost exponents of prefabricated building in Scotland during the period. Iron churches were available in various sizes and patterns and could be ordered from the company catalogues. Once relatively common, it is now unusual to find such a building being used for its intended purpose. The distinctive octagonal window is a feature repeated in similar churches by this company including The Mill Shop, Fort Augustus and the Church Hall at St Johns, Selkirk (see separate listings). The pointed-arch hood-moulded timber windows also add to the exterior interest.

Although damaged by fire in 1953, the extant interior scheme (seen in 2012) is noteworthy. It is a combination of saved and restored elements including the altar, desk and chair, lectern and various monuments, alongside bespoke later 20th century fabrics and furnishings to create a unified whole.

Manufactured in 1905, the building was moved a short distance from its original location near the 6th hole of the Craigforth Golf Course to to its current site, adjacent to the golf course, in 1923. Its relocation cost just under 400 pounds.

Speirs & Co was a design and build Glasgow-based firm, in operation from 1880s to the 1930s, which provided partly prefabricated timber framed buildings, some clad in corrugated iron, notably for the Episcopal Church. In 1902 they also had an office in London and advertised that they provided iron and wood buildings for churches, schools, reading rooms, village halls, motor sheds, club houses, bungalows, cottages, hospitals and sanitoria and had facilities for erecting them in any part of the Kingdom. In 1910 they described themselves as 'Designers and Erectors of Iron and Wood Buildings'.

References

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