St Paul's Church

St Paul’s Church stands in the village of Hooton, a quiet settlement in Cheshire West and Chester. It is an active Anglican parish church, part of the deanery of Wirral South, the archdeaconry of Chester, and the diocese of Chester. The building is listed at Grade II* on the National Heritage List for England. Experts writing in the Buildings of England series call it one of the most spectacular churches in Cheshire. Between 1858 and 1862 the Liverpool banker R. C. Naylor commissioned James K. Colling to design the church. The church mixes red and white ashlar stone with red rock-faced stone for its walls. The roofs are covered in slate and the plan forms a cross, with a nave, aisles, transepts, a chancel and an ambulatory. Above the crossing rises a lantern on pendentives, topped by a short spire. A detached belfry spire crowns the south porch, while the west porch follows Romanesque style and holds a rose window. Inside, Peterhead granite supports the arcades, their capitals carved in French Early Gothic style. The font is made from dark green serpentine and dates from 1851, when it won a medal at the Great Exhibition. Stained glass windows by Heaton, Butler and Bayne, Clayton and Bell, and Kempe fill the building with colour. A two-manual organ built by Rushworth and Dreaper stands in the nave. Outside, the churchyard contains the war graves of five Second World War airmen, four British and one Australian.