St Mary's Church, Hinckley

St Mary’s Church stands in the centre of Hinckley, Leicestershire. The oldest building in the town, it is an Anglican parish church built by William FitzOsbern after the Norman Conquest. A Grade II* listed structure, it has watched Hinckley grow for nearly nine centuries. Traces of an earlier Anglo-Saxon church remain visible on the chancel’s south-east buttress. The church’s income once belonged to a Norman abbey, later passing through Westminster and Peterborough before reaching the Bishop of Leicester in 1926. A Benedictine priory once stood beside it until demolished in the 19th century to make way for cottages. The church is worth visiting for its long and layered history. The present building dates mainly from the 13th and 14th centuries, with parts rebuilt in the 1870s by architect Ewan Christian. The Victorian restoration enlarged the aisles to seat 1,200 worshippers on oak pews, and a plaque remembers the hard-working vicar, Rev W.H. Disney. The tower and spire, rising over 55 metres, dominate the skyline and carry a copper weathercock from 1788. Recent repairs have renewed crumbling stonework and stabilised the Lady Chapel’s east wall. Inside, the church is unusually broad for its length, almost square in plan. The font, moved in 1888, bears the words of Jesus about children. The tower arch, with its flat four-centred curve, is a fine example of early 14th-century craftsmanship. The North Chapel has become a quiet coffee bar, offering a place to rest after climbing the winding stair to the battlements. From the top, visitors look out over Hinckley and as far as Coventry on clear days.