ARCHITECTURE
George Goldie Paul Waddington looks at some of the churches designed by a most prolific Catholic Architect
G
eorge Goldie was born in 1828 in York, the son on the chief physician of the York County Hospital, also called George Goldie. However, the younger George was not to follow his father into the medical profession, but rather to become an architect, like his maternal grandfather. Goldie’s mother, Mary Anne, was the daughter of Giuseppe Bonomi who had emigrated from Italy to work for Robert Adam, the famous designer of English country houses. Besides his work for Robert Adam, Giuseppe Bonomi was the architect of two Catholic churches in London. His Church of Our Lady of the Assumption and St Gregory in Warwick Street, replaced the chapel of the Bavarian Embassy, which was largely destroyed in the Gordon Riots of 1780. Bonomi’s other London Church, was the original St James’ in Spanish Place, which was replaced in the 1930s by the present and much larger St James’ designed by Bonomi’s great grandson Edward Goldie. George Goldie, the subject of this article, was educated at Ushaw College, where it is possible that he met Augustus Welby Pugin, who was working on the chapel at the time. Aged 17, he began his architectural training in Sheffield with the firm of Weightman and Hadfield, where he later became a partner. Matthew Ellison Hadfield was something of a specialist in Catholic churches, now best known for his cathedrals at Salford and Sheffield. In 1858, Goldie moved to London, where he practised first on his own and later in partnership with Charles Edwin Child. In 1875, Goldie’s son Edward joined the partnership. Goldie’s first commissions were secular buildings in Sheffield, and his first church was St Patrick’s in Bradford, opened in 1853 and still standing. He also built the presbytery, the adjacent convent, now occupied by the Franciscans of the Renewal, and a school. From then on commissions came thick and fast, with more than 50 Catholic churches, cathedrals and convents to his credit over the next forty years. We can only look at a few of his works.
28
Cathedral of Immaculate Conception, Sligo
St Ninian’s at Wooler, Northumberland, opened in 1856 and is worth noting. Built of stone, and located in a spacious churchyard, its bell tower, although not high, carries a steep, knife-edge roof topped with decorative ironwork, a feature that was to become almost Goldie’s trademark. The church of St Mary and St Romuald in Yarm, was opened in 1860. Built of brick with stone dressings, it has the trademark ironwork over the chancel. Of particular note is the most unusual belfry which almost defies description.
St Ninian, Wooler
St Pancras, Ipswich
In 1866, Goldie added a tower to Hansom’s Church of St Edward the Confessor at Clifford in the West Riding. Hansom’s church is a fine edifice, but it is completely dominated by the tower that Goldie somewhat awkwardly attached to the west end. As we shall see, towers were an obsession with Goldie. They are a prominent feature of most of his churches, and if the funds would not run to a tower, he would provide a belfry sufficiently spectacular to make up for the omission. The church of St Pancras in Ipswich, which dates from 1861, is an exception,
SUMMER 2018
