IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
Church Close, TADWORTH, KT20 7DH

North wall detail.

Basilica-like interior.

South wall detail.

See Image for background to the church. This is the baptistry, walled and floored in various marbles and with an alabaster font.

The carved block is said to be a capital from the basilica of St John at Ephesus, and is one of a number of relics displayed in the church of the Wisdom of God, Lower Kingswood. All were brought back from Turkey by Dr Edwin Freshfield in the late 19th century. Capitals from Ephesus are displayed in the north and south aisles, while a number of smaller relics (mostly from Constantinople) have been mounted in the church's west wall. Descriptions of the church tend to focus on decorative details - plainly Byzantine in inspiration. But the Byzantine influence is more radical than that - the founders (Edwin Freshfield and Sir Cosmo Bonsor) chose a basilican plan and elevations, with a lofty apse at the east end.

The Surrey volume of Pevsner lists the dedication as 'St Sophia', though it now seems to go by the name of 'Wisdom of God'. To my eye, there are few clues externally as to what to expect inside. But notice the semi-circular west window - which might (just) have been inspired by Hagia Sophia in Constantinople - the church of the Holy Wisdom. To be found inside are a number of fragments of Byzantine sculpture, including two huge capitals from a church at Ephesus. They were brought back by a Dr Edwin Freshfield, who - along with his collaborator Sir Cosmo Bonsor - seems to have been a great enthusiast for the early Eastern church. The two men commissioned the design from the architect Sidney Barnsley, who produced an interior unmistakably Byzantine in inspiration. Pevsner gives a date for Barnsley's church of 1891. To my mind it has something in common (especially in terms of materials) with two other Surrey churches of about the same era: Image - by Harrison Townsend (who went on to design the Horniman Museum); and Image - by Lutyens Both of those designs are later than Barnsley's. I'd be curious to know whether the two better-known men were familiar with Barnsley's work at Lower Kingswood.

This grade I listed church (for listing particulars see www.historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1029052 ) was dedicated on 17 July 1892. It was the inspiration of two local residents, Dr Edwin Freshfield (who was solicitor to the Bank of England) and Sir Henry Cosmo Orme Bonsor (MP and brewer, and owner of nearby Kingswood Warren), who instructed the architect Sidney Barnsley to design it based on a Roman basilica. Although the external appearance of this church is relatively plain, with the only features being the rounded archway above the main door and some lines of herringbone brickwork, its splendour is inside - see Image