St Peter’s Church, Hampton Lucy

St Peter’s Church in Hampton Lucy is a very grand church for a very small village. Looking rather like an Oxford college, it’s a prominent view from neighbouring Charlecote Park, as you can see from this photo taken on a walk at Charlecote earlier this year.

We’ve often seen this Victorian Gothic Revival church at a distance, glimpsed here on the day we got engaged at Charlecote.

And again on the same day…

But we’d never actually been inside until Sunday, when we called in after Sunday roast at the Boar’s Head in Hampton Lucy. The most wonderfully autumnal scene greeted us at the gate – a scene surely little changed since the church in its present form was built, in 1826.

The keyhole – clearly designed to accommodate a key of considerable proportions – offered a tantalising view up the aisle of the church. Sadly my photographic efforts, as pictured here, were fruitless, so the excitement of looking through the keyhole remains uncaptured!

After some grappling with the door, we ventured inside. The interior of the church feels more like a cathedral, both in its spaciousness and its freezing temperatures!

We had the place completely to ourselves. I always find old churches incredibly atmospheric, and one certainly doesn’t have to be religious to appreciate them. There was a much older church here before this one, but the owners of Charlecote Park – the Lucy family – replaced it with this one. There are traces of older parts still left, but we didn’t have long enough to explore (we had a wedding fayre to get to!). Plenty to discover on our next visit, when we’ll have a bit more time to take it all in.