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1. St Mary, Acton, Cheshire, England

Parish church
St Mary's is built of red sandstone ashlar. It has a four-bay aisled nave with a clerestorey; the aisles extending W alongside the tower, and the present clerestorey a rebuilding of 1879. The arcade piers are mid 13thc., but they have been heightened, and the capitals are late 19thc., part of Paley and Austin's restoration of 1897-98, although one of the originals survives as a loose stone in the S aisle. The W tower is also 13thc. in its lower parts. It was once over 100 feet tall, but the top of it fell in 1757 and was rebuilt shortly afterwards by William Baker. The chancel arch is 14thc., but the long chancel itself is Perpendicular, articulated inside with colossal four-centred wall arcading. It has a N chapel added after the nave aisles, and the N aisle E window survives, with its tracery but lacking its glazing, inside the church (something similar took place at Bunbury). The grandest monument is a large 17thc. chest tomb with recumbent figures of Sir Richard and Lady Elizabeth Wilbraham in the S aisle. More interesting is the wall tomb in the N aisle, with an alabaster effigy of Sir William Mainwaring (d.1399). The figural but mutilated font is Romanesque, as are a series of important carved stones, some figural, at present at the E end of the S aisle, behind the Wilbraham tomb.
2. St Andrew, Bebington (Lower), Cheshire, England

Parish church
St Andrew's is basically a Norman church that was extended in the 14thc. and 16thc. The church may have been cruciform, with an aisleless nave, and a three-bay S arcade was added in the 12thc. On the N the aisle windows are early 14thc., so an arcade of some form must have been present by then. In the 16thc. a fourth bay was added to both arcades at the E. The central vessel between the arcades is notably wider in the E bay, and the lines of the arcades have been modified to compensate, apparently in the 1870-72 restoration. On the N side the original arcade was entirely replaced with a copy of the 12thc. S arcade to effect a smooth transition, but on the S only the easternmost Romanesque bay was replaced, and this doglegs to meet the Perpendicular E pier. The S aisle windows have Y-tracery of c.1300, and at the W end of this aisle is the tower, of similar date and with a broach spire. The chancel and its arch are Perpendicular, as are the large chapels to either side of it, with three-bay arcades to the chancel and broad arches to the nave aisles. The restoration was by W.J. and G.A. Ashdown of Liverpool (1870-72). The church is of greyish pink sandstone ashlar.
3. Birkenhead Priory, Birkenhead, Cheshire, England

Former Benedictine Priory
The priory was originally isolated on a headland overlooking the Mersey, but is now entirely hemmed in by what remains of the shipyard graving docks and by a recently built industrial estate. A promenade has been built along the waterside, offering splendid views of Liverpool across the river, but no part of the priory is visible from this.
4. St Mary, Bowdon, Cheshire, England

Parish church
St Mary's is a substantial church of 1858-60 by W. H. Brakspear, spacious within and equipped outside with an array of battlements and pinnacles. It has a W tower, a clerestoreyed, aisled nave of six bays, N and S transepts, and a chancel with an organ loft and vestry on the N side and a chapel on the S. The stone is a pink sandstone. There is a collection of loose stones in the N transept, including the Romanesque fragments described below.
5. St Mary, Bruera, Cheshire, England

Parish church (benefice of Aldford and Bruera).
Bruera is in SW Cheshire, 4 miles S of the centre of Chester. It is a manor house village consisting only of the church, a moated site immediately to the NW and a few scattered houses nearby. There are traces of ridge-and-furrow cultivation in the surrounding fields.
6. Chester Cathedral, Chester, Cheshire, England

Benedictine Abbey originally, now Cathedral
The church was begun in 1092, presumably at the E. Of the 11th-12thc. work the E wall of the N transept survives, with a chapel arch and above it a triforium. Judging from the evidence of the fabric, the chapel, originally apsed, was remodelled early in the 13thc. and given a square end. Towards the end of the 14thc. a doorway was inserted from the chapel into the N choir aisle, and it may have been at that time that the arch into the transept was walled up and the chapel turned into a vestry. It remained blocked and invisible, at least from the transept side, until 1930, when it was re-opened. At that time 'traces of colour and patterns' were visible (Story of Chester 1939), but they are not now. The higher levels of the transept are Perpendicular. The only other 12thc. feature of the church is the tower at the W end of the N aisle, now a baptistery and dateable stylistically some 40-50 years after the N transept. Inside the church its E and S arches and its N window have scallop capitals, and the remains of a similar window are visible in the W bay of the N aisle wall. For the rest of the church, the five-bay choir can be dated to c.1300, the Lady Chapel slightly earlier (c.1260-80), and the crossing and S transept to the early- to mid-14thc. The nave arcades appear uniform on N and S, but in fact the S side belongs to the 1360s and the N to Abbot Ripley's time (1485-93). St Werburgh's Chapel was a late Perpendicular addition to the end of the N choir aisle.
7. All Saints, Church Lawton, Cheshire, England

Parish church
The present church has a 16thc. W tower, but the remainder of the medieval church was destroyed by fire in 1798 and rebuilt in brick as a preaching hall in 1801-03. A 12thc. doorway has been reset under a porch in the S wall of the nave.
8. St John the Baptist, Chester, Cheshire, England

Originally collegiate church, now parish church
The Romanesque church was a cruciform building with an aisled nave with triforium and clerestorey; N and S transepts and an aisled eastern arm with a gallery rather than a triforium. Of the nave, the four eastern bays and the beginning of a fifth survive. In the fifth bay was a 13thc. north doorway under a porch, and west of the sixth stood the façade. There is no evidence for the original form of this beyond the ruinous lower part of a NW tower. This tower collapsed partially in 1572 and more drastically in 1574, destroying the western bays of the nave, and was rebuilt on a magnificent scale. Until 1881 it was reportedly the glory of the exterior and a notable Chester landmark, but in that year, while long-overdue repairs were taking place, it collapsed again, destroying the Early English north porch, which was rebuilt by J. Douglas in 1881-82. The eastern arm of the church was originally aisled and of five straight bays, but now the entire north aisle has been removed (except for its eastern chapel; see below). Of the main vessel and south aisle only a single bay survives within the building, which terminates in a straight wall. The remainder of the eastern arm was abandoned in 1547, when the King's Commissioners decided that the nave alone was sufficient for the parish, and that the lead on the choir roof along with the metal of four of the church's five bells should be removed and sold. To the east, outside the building, parts of the S choir aisle wall still stand, along with what remains of the east chapels. Originally the main vessel terminated in a deep apsidal chapel, and the aisles in shallower ones. All three chapels were remodelled and enlarged in the later middle ages, but the 12thc. wall containing their entrance arches still stands. This is in a disastrously eroded condition, which should be borne in mind while reading the descriptions of its elements in this site report.
9. St Mary de Castro, Chester, Cheshire, England

Originally castle chapel, now Regimental chapel
The present Chester Castle is largely Thomas Harrison's group of county buildings, dating from 1788-1822, and including the courts and the Shire Hall. The main medieval survival is Agricola's Tower, a three-storey tower on a rectangular plan, with a doorway to the south. The tower dates from the 12thc., but there was a fire in 1302, after which the lower room was remodelled entirely. Romanesque interest centres on the 2nd-storey chapel. This is a single space vaulted in two rectangular bays with quadripartite rib-vaults and an altar at the east. The present author was unable to gain access, and this report is based on what can be seen of the chapel through the grille that closes it off. For the guidance of future researchers, the chapel is now the Regimental Chapel of the Cheshire Regiment, and entry is controlled by the staff of the Military Museum, also on the castle site, who require at least two weeks' notice in advance of any visit.
10. St Lawrence, Frodsham, Cheshire, England

Parish church
St Lawrence's has a W tower, an aisled and clerestoreyed nave with three-bay arcades of c.1180 and a shorter fourth bay on either side at the E end, dating from Bodley and Garner's restoration of 1880-83. The 14thc. chancel was extended eastward in the 15thc. It has a 16thc. N chapel with an organ loft and vestry and a large S chapel. The 1880s restoration is everywhere apparent, even in the arcades (see below) but the 18thc. porches were left alone. Construction is of reddish sandstone. 12thc. stones are reset in the interior S wall of the tower.
11. St Wilfrid, Grappenhall, Cheshire, England

Parish church
St Wilfrid's has a long nave and chancel, continuous inside and out with no chancel arch but the division marked by a step. N and S aisles occupy the five bays of the nave and two bays of the chancel; a short aisleless section of chancel at the E end is raised for the main altar. At the W end is a tower, and a transeptal vestry has been added to the N chancel aisle. The earliest part of the fabric is the remnant of a corbel table high in the N wall of the S aisle. This indicates an early 12thc. aisleless church. In 1334 the Boydell Chapel was added alongside this nave on the S side, and features of this remain in the S windows and some of the glass. In 1525-39 there was a major rebuilding involving the construction of both arcades and aisles, and the W tower. The clerestorey was added in 1833, and remodelled in the major restoration of 1874 by Paley and Austin. The N vestry also dates from this restoration. The font and the corbels in the S aisle are described below.
12. St Oswald, Lower Peover, Cheshire, England

originally chapel of ease, now parish church
A spectacular and important timber church with a stone W tower, said to be of 1582 (see Pevsner) but probably earlier. The aisled nave (13th-14thc.) is of four bays, and the slightly lower chancel of two, all timber work with box pews. The nave aisles continue alongside the chancel, the N aisle dating from 1624 and the S from c.1610. They now house an organ loft and vestry to the N and the Shakerley Chapel to the S. The three vessels have separate roofs, built by Salvin in his restoration of 1852, but originally the nave and its aisles shared a single roof. The church was founded in 1269, hence none of the fabric is 12thc. What is at issue is the font, said to have been brought from Norton Priory in 1322.
13. St Thomas, Mellor, Cheshire, England

Originally chapel of ease, now parish church
Mellor stands in the High Peak on the border with Derbyshire. Indeed it was in Derbyshire until 1936 when it was reassigned, along with neighbouring Ludworth, to Cheshire. Recent excavations have disclosed an Iron Age hill fort alongside the church. St Thomas's was formerly a chapel of ease to Glossop in Derbyshire, and remains in the Glossop Deanery of the Diocese of Derby. The church has a 15thc. W tower, but whatever was to the east of this was replaced from 1815 to 1830 with a simple aisleless nave and chancel of brick. Something similar took place at Church Lawton. The only Romanesque feature is the font, one of the most interesting in the county.
14. St Michael and All Angels, Middlewich, Cheshire, England

Parish church
St Michael's is a large church, mainly Perpendicular, with a W tower of c.1500 over the end of the N nave aisle, and an aisled, clerestoreyed nave of four Perpendicular bays with a fifth narrow bay of late 12thc. date at the E end of each arcade. The aisles continue alongside the chancel, providing an organ loft and vestry on the N side, and a spacious chapel on the S. The chancel aisles are divided from the main vessel by two-bay arcades, that on the N of the 13thc. The S aisle is canted at the E and W ends. The exterior is faced with red sandstone, but its appearance owes much to the intrusive restoration of 1857-60 by Joseph Clarke. 12thc. work is found in the narrow E bays of the nave arcades and a loose chevron voussoir.
15. Norton Priory, Cheshire, England

Augustinian Priory, now owned by Norton Priory Museum Trust
What survives is the undercroft of the west range of the cloister, once the west front of the house. A portico was added to the west front in 1886, and at the S end is a late-12thc. doorway assumed to be the reset chapter house doorway of the priory. At the N end of the portico is a replica of this doorway dating from 1886. The 12thc. doorway gives access to bay 3 of the undercroft, and the 19thc. copy of it to bay 4. Slight remains of an earlier doorway can be seen behind the replica. To the E of the undercroft, entry to the cloister is by large unarticulated arches in bays 2 and 3.
16. Prestbury, Norman Chapel, Cheshire, England

Chapel
The chapel stands in the churchyard of St Peter's, Prestbury, to the SE of the church. It is a simple two-cell stone building dating in its present form from 1747, in which year it was restored by Sir William Meredith of Henbury. It incorporates on its west facade 12thc. sculpture in the form of a doorway and a row of figures above, but the rest of the building is 18thc. work. The original chapel is assumed to have been built as the parish church in the 12thc., and when its successor, the present parish church, was begun in the 1220s or 1230s, it was retained as an oratory. By 1592, when it was sketched by Randle Holmes, it was ruinous and roofless. An inscription on the W gable records the restoration of 1747 in exchange for which the Merediths were granted rights of burial inside it.
17. St Edith, Shocklach, Cheshire,

Parish church (benefice of Tilston and Shocklach)
St Edith's has an aisleless 12thc. nave with a 14thc. chancel, its E window with flowing tracery. There is no tower, but a 12thc. double bellcote on the W gable of the nave. A pair of buttresses on the W wall encloses a vestibule. The N doorway is a later modification; pointed and now half blocked to turn it into a window. On the S side, and unprotected by a porch, is one of the finest Romanesque doorways in Cheshire. A plain N vestry was added to the chancel in 1926, but otherwise the church has received little attention in recent years. Construction is of irregular sandstone blocks with thick mortar courses. A corbel above N doorway is not Romanesque and is illustrated for reference only.
18. St Michael, Shotwick, Cheshire, England

Parish church
St Michael's has a 12thc. nave with its S doorway under a very simple ashlar porch. A N aisle with a four-bay arcade was added c.1300. The chancel has no arch, but dates in its earliest parts from the 13thc. It has a two-bay N chapel - an extension eastwards of the N aisle with a two-bay arcade to the chancel. Both this and the W tower date from c.1500. The present double-span roof is 19thc., replacing a 15thc. single-span roof over nave and aisle. Construction is of red sandstone ashlar.