Our Lady and St Brigid's Church, Northfield

Our Lady and St Brigid’s Church stands in Northfield, a suburb of Birmingham in the West Midlands. It is a Roman Catholic parish church built of red brick with a clerestoried nave, aisles, a chancel and a south chapel. The bell tower rises above the south-west porch, giving the building a distinctive outline. A temporary church was erected in 1931 before the present structure was completed in 1936. Architect Ernest Bower Norris designed the current church, which replaced the earlier mission established on Steel Road in 1918. The church is worth visiting for its large Resurrection mural painted by Neil Harvey and finished in 2000. George Mesher served as priest when the mission began, and Frank Warwick and his family were among the first boarders. Land for the permanent building was bought in 1936, the same year the new church was completed. The Harris organ once housed here is recorded on the National Pipe Organ Register. Its nave and aisles create a wide, light interior suited to congregational worship. Inside, the nave opens into aisles that lead to the chancel and south chapel. The Resurrection mural covers a large wall, drawing the eye upward. The brick walls and clerestory windows give the space a calm, orderly feel. The bell tower above the porch adds vertical emphasis to the exterior. Visitors find a quiet place for reflection, its architecture shaped by early 20th-century Catholic mission work.