The church of St. Peter and St. Paul sits at the end of Church Lane on the W edge of this charming village, idyllically surrounded by trees and to the W an agricultural field. Constructed mostly of local ironstone, it consists of a clerestoried nave with N and S aisles, chancel with N and S chapels and a vestry, and a W tower. The chancel with its chapels is of the 13thc. and in the 14thc. they were remodeled. The S porch is of the early 14thc. when the S aisle was also reconstructed; later in the 14thc. the embattled W tower and clerestory were added. There was a major restoration here in 1856 which included the addition of the vestry. The earliest elements of the church, from Romanesque period, consist of the nave N doorway, the N and S aisles of the nave, and the chancel arch responds.

There is no mention of Preston in Domesday Book but it is thought that it may have been one of the seven outliers, or berewicks, of Ridlington manor which belonged to Queen Edith in 1066. In 1086 Domesday Book notes that Ridlington and its outliers had two priests and three churches. If Preston was one of these outliers, the land and the advowson belonged to the king. The church is specifically mentioned in 1223 when Henry III gave a gift of hay to the parson of the church at Preston.

In the N arcade, the transition from the square W respond capital and pier 2 capital to the circular pier 1 capital and semi-circular, polygonal E respond, as well as the shift from ornate chevron use in the arches of bays 2 and 3 to plain chamfered steps in the arch of bay 1 all suggest that construction of this arcade started at the W end and proceeded E. This work was likely begun c. 1150 when the N aisle was added, and with it, the N aisle door.

The S arcade, with its uniform design elements and two orders of plain, chamfered, round-headed arches, is a classic example of Transitional style work done c. 1200. In the S arcade, the human head label stop above pier 2 is similar to those found just up the road on the S arcade of the nave of St. Mary in Manton.