St Paul's Anglican Church
High Street,, RUSHWORTH VIC 3612 - Property No B4126
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Statement of Significance
What is significant? St. Paul's church was designed by the prominent architects Vahland and Getzschmann of Bendigo. Although the foundation stone was laid by Bishop James Perry on 1 April 1869, it was not until 9 October 1870 that the church was dedicated and opened by Archbishop Crawford of Castlemaine. The church is a red brick building on a stone base with stucco dressings to the gable ends, the sloping steps to the various buttresses and the window sills. The prominent site disguises the smallness of the church. A two stage tower, containing the belfry, is surmounted by a short spire with four spirelets at the corners of the level of its springing. The tower has corner buttresses which give it further prominence and embrace the entry porch.
The adjacent Sunday School was dedicated in 1903. Despite its much later date it used similar brick and stucco construction to relate to the church.
How is it significant? St. Paul's Anglican Church, Rushworth is significant for architectural, historic, and social reasons at a State level.
Why is it significant? The church is historically and socially significant at a state level because it represents an unusual style, the 'Neugotik' that dominated the German speaking part of Europe and provides a visual identification of the influence of the German migrant community in Victoria. Architecturally this is expressed in the fine brickwork and careful detailing on the prominent entrance front. Aesthetically the visually strong and successfully detailed elements give the facade a larger scale and sense of importance than would normally be expected in a building of this size. This is enhanced by the choice of its site on top of the hill overlooking the town.
St. Paul's is one of a group of five somewhat similar sized small churches designed by this eminent and prolific architectural practice. All are designed in an idiosyncratic Gothic style, but only three of these have the central entry on the west end with a bell-cote forming a central tower with a spire over as required by the 'Neugotik'. Of these only St. Paul's Rushworth has the powerful splayed buttresses on the corners of the tower.
Architecturally it is the most successful of the five churches. Only St.Luke'sAnglican church, Napier St., White Hills, Bendigo comes near it in architectural quality but it is a polychrome, polytexture brick Gothic church in a more English style. Two of the others employ a similar, but simpler, central entrance but with a flatter roof pitch and without the powerful splayed buttresses of the tower.
Classified: 17/08/1978
Revised: 23/02/2009
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FORMER RUSHWORTH CHRONICLE STEAM PRINTING OFFICEVictorian Heritage Register H0941
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RUSHWORTH COURT HOUSEVictorian Heritage Register H1483
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GROWLERS HILLVictorian Heritage Inventory
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