Leeds Cathedral

Church in West Yorkshire, England

Leeds Cathedral

Cathedral Church of St Anne

Leeds Cathedral

Shown within West Yorkshire

53°48′03″N 1°32′48″W﻿ / ﻿53.8007°N 1.5468°W﻿ / 53.8007; -1.5468
OS grid reference| SE 29947 33908
Location| Leeds, West Yorkshire
Country| England
Denomination| Catholic Church
Website| dioceseofleeds.org.uk/cathedral
History
Consecrated| 1904
Architecture
Heritage designation| Grade II*
Architect(s)| John Henry Eastwood
Style| Neo-gothic
Years built| 1901-1904
Specifications
Number of towers| 1
Administration
Province| Liverpool (since 1911)
Diocese| Leeds (since 1878)
Deanery| Leeds North
Parish| Mother of Unfailing Help
Clergy
Bishop(s)| Marcus Stock (since 2014)
Dean| Matthew Habron (since 2019)
Laity
Director of music| Benjamin Saunders
Organist(s)| William Campbell

Leeds Cathedral, formally the Cathedral Church of St Anne, also known as Saint Anne's Cathedral, is the cathedral of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Leeds, and is the seat of the Roman Catholic Bishop of Leeds. It is in the city of Leeds, West Yorkshire, United Kingdom. The city of Leeds does not have a Church of England cathedral although it is in the Anglican Diocese of Leeds. The cathedrals of the Anglican diocese are in Ripon, Wakefield and Bradford. The city instead has a Minster which is similar to nearby Dewsbury Minster and Halifax Minster, all of which are parish churches.

The original cathedral was located in St Anne's Church in 1878, but that building was demolished around 1900. The current cathedral building on Cookridge Street was completed in 1904, and was restored in 2006. The reredos of the old cathedral's high altar was designed by Pugin in 1842 and moved to the lady chapel of the new cathedral.[1][2] The cathedral is a Grade II* listed building.[3]

The cathedral and the Church of the Holy Rosary on Chapeltown Road together serve the Leeds parish of Our Lady of Unfailing Help.[4]

## History

[edit]

### Previous cathedral

[edit]

In 1786, Lady Lane Chapel was built, the first post-reformation Catholic place of worship in the city. In 1838, it was replaced by St Anne's Church. At the time, there were only two places of Catholic worship in Leeds, St Patrick's Church (which was built in 1831) and St Anne's. The next church to be built in Leeds was Mount St Mary's Church in Richmond Hill.[5]

The earlier St Anne's Roman Catholic Church, built in 1838 on the corner of the Headrow and Cookridge Street was granted cathedral status in 1878 upon the creation of the Diocese of Leeds.[3] The cathedral's life was short-lived as in 1899, Leeds Corporation pushed ahead with plans to widen The Headrow and develop it into a Boulevard style street. This meant that the cathedral was acquired by the enactment of a compulsory purchase order. Demolition started shortly after and the Leeds Permanent Building Society purchased the plot to build its head-office; the site is now The Light entertainment complex. Church officials considered several sites on which to build the second cathedral but after exhausting other options, the church accepted land offered to it by the corporation, directly adjacent to the previous church.[6] Some architectural features of the original building were salvaged and reused in the new building and some can now be seen at the Castle-by-the-Sea Hotel in Scarborough, North Yorkshire, the former residence of the artist Atkinson Grimshaw, who was the father of the first cathedral choir master, Arthur E. Grimshaw.[7]

### Current building

[edit]

The current cathedral was designed in the Arts and Crafts Gothic Revival style by John Henry Eastwood (1843–1913), a Leeds-born and London-based architect with previous experience in designing church buildings, much work was also carried out by his assistant, Sydney Kyffin Greenslade (1866–1955).[3] The layout of the cathedral incorporated no wings, in order to accommodate it on the small site. Building work began in the autumn of 1901 and the cathedral opened in 1904.[6]

After renovation in the cathedral (2005–2006) relics of English Catholic martyrs, Blessed Peter Snow and Ralph Grimston, were placed in the altar.[8]

## Building

[edit]

Interior (looking towards the altar)

The cathedral is small in size due to its restricted site.[1] The cathedral has an aisled nave and chancel under a continuous roof with narrow transepts and chapels. There is a chapter house and presbytery. It is built of Weldon stone with Ketton stone details. The west front has a tall gable between large buttresses that end in Gothic turrets.[9] The western face has a large ornate crucifix sculpture. The northern face has mock-Georgian elements to it, including leaded bay windows. The church has a small tower to the north west corner, from which the flag of Vatican City is flown.[dubious - discuss] The interior has a conventional layout, with rows of pews facing towards the altar, there are two rows of stone pillars set along each side. The ceiling has a barrelled shape, with only a faint apex.

## Organs

[edit]

Flag of Vatican City flying atop the cathedral

The 1904 organ by Norman and Beard was restored and enlarged in 2010 by Klais Orgelbau. It has seven divisions and 55 ranks.[10]

The cathedral also houses a chamber organ. This small box organ was manufactured by Peter Collins in 1992. It is a portable instrument and is usually located between the choir stalls in the Sanctuary. It is in daily use to accompany Gregorian chant.

## See also

[edit]

* Grade II* listed buildings in Leeds
* Listed buildings in Leeds (City and Hunslet Ward - northern area)

## References

[edit]

1. ^ a b Floorplan, Leeds Diocese, archived from the original on 31 January 2009, retrieved 23 May 2010
2. ^ "Restoring a masterpiece", BBC Leeds, retrieved 31 January 2009
3. ^ a b c Historic England, "St Anne's RC Cathedral (1375230)", National Heritage List for England, retrieved 23 May 2010
4. ^ Parish of Our Lady of Unfailing Help, Bulletin and Mass Sheet (available weekly in the Cathedral)
5. ^ Fraser, Derek, A History of Modern Leeds (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1980), 256.
6. ^ a b History, Leeds Diocese, archived from the original on 15 June 2010, retrieved 23 May 2010
7. ^ Castle by the Sea, archived from the original on 6 February 2009, retrieved 21 December 2008
8. ^ Finnigan KSS, Robert. A Guide to Leeds Cathedral. Diocese of Leeds.
9. ^ Leach & Pevsner 2009, p. 406
10. ^ "The Klais Organ", Diocese of Leeds Music Department, archived from the original on 15 March 2012, retrieved 27 November 2010

### Bibliography

[edit]

* Leach, Peter; Pevsner, Nikolaus (2009), The Buildings of England: Yorkshire West Riding, Leeds, Bradford and the North, New Haven and London: Yale University Press, ISBN 978-0-300-12665-5

## External links

[edit]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Leeds Cathedral.

* Leeds Cathedral website

* v
* t
* e

Roman Catholic Diocese of Leeds

* Roman Catholic Bishops of Leeds

* I: Robert Cornthwaite
* II: William Gordon
* III: Joseph Robert Cowgill
* IV: Henry John Poskitt
* V: John Carmel Heenan
* VI: George Patrick Dwyer
* VII: Gordon Wheeler
* VIII: David Konstant
* IX: Arthur Roche (Bishop Emeritus)
* X: Marcus Stock

* Parishes

* Leeds Cathedral \- Cathedral Church of St Anne

* St Joseph's Church, Bishop Thornton
* St Joseph's, Bradford
* St Mary's Church, Carlton
* St Edward's, Clifford
* St Mary's, Halifax
* St Robert's, Harrogate
* Holy Redeemer, Huddersfield
* St Mary's Church, Knaresborough
* St Jeanne Jugan, Leeds
* Saint John Henry Newman, Leeds
* St Patrick's, Leeds
* St Ignatius, Ossett
* St Wilfrid's Church, Ripon
* Church of the Immaculate Conception, Scarthingwell
* St Stephen's, Skipton
* St Austin's and English Martyrs, Wakefield
* St Joseph's Wetherby
* Leeds Trinity University

* Patronal Feasts of the Diocese

* Our Lady of Perpetual Succour (27 June)
* St Wilfrid (12 October)

* Schools

* All Saints, Huddersfield
* Cardinal Heenan, Meanwood
* Corpus Christi, Leeds
* Leeds Trinity University
* Mount St Mary's, Leeds
* Notre Dame, Leeds
* St Bede's & St Joseph's, Bradford
* St Catherine's, Halifax
* St John Fisher, Dewsbury
* St John Fisher, Harrogate
* St John's School for the Deaf, Boston Spa
* St Mary's Menston
* St Thomas à Becket, Wakefield
* St Wilfrid's, Featherstone

* See also:

* Bradford Girls' Choir
* The Bishop Wheeler Catholic Academy Trust
* Mount St Mary's Church, Leeds
* Diocese of Beverley

* v
* t
* e

Cathedrals of the Catholic Church in the United Kingdom and Ireland

England
and
Wales|

| Province of Westminster|

* Brentwood
* Norwich
* Northampton
* Nottingham
* Westminster

|

Province of Birmingham|

* Birmingham
* Clifton
* Shrewsbury

Province of Liverpool|

* Lancaster
* Leeds
* Liverpool
* Middlesbrough
* Newcastle-upon-Tyne
* Salford
* Sheffield

Province of Southwark|

* Arundel
* Plymouth
* Portsmouth
* Southwark

Province of Cardiff|

* Cardiff
* Swansea
* Wrexham

Other dioceses|

* Bishopric of the Forces
* Syro-Malabar Eparchy
* Ukrainian Eparchy

Scotland|

| Province of
St Andrews & Edinburgh|

* Aberdeen
* Ayr
* Dundee
* Edinburgh
* Oban

|

Province of Glasgow|

* Glasgow
* Motherwell
* Paisley

Ireland|

| Province of Armagh|

* Armagh
* Belfast
* Cavan
* Derry
* Letterkenny
* Longford
* Monaghan
* Mullingar
* Newry

|

Province of Cashel|

* Cobh
* Cork
* Ennis
* Killarney
* Limerick
* Skibbereen
* Thurles
* Waterford

Province of Dublin|

* Carlow
* Dublin
* Enniscorthy
* Kilkenny

Province of Tuam|

* Ballaghaderreen
* Ballina
* Galway
* Loughrea
* Sligo
* Tuam

Provincial mother churches are shown in bold
Catholicism portal
Lists of cathedrals in
Ireland
England
Wales
Scotland

* v
* t
* e

Listed buildings in Leeds

* List by ward
* Grade I
* Grade II*

Grade I|

* Leeds Town Hall
* St John's Church
* Kirkgate Market
* Corn Exchange
* Holy Trinity Church
* Leeds General Infirmary
* Leeds Minster
* Temple Works
* Harewood House / Castle
* Kirkstall Abbey
* Morley Town Hall
* Fulneck Moravian Church
* Temple Newsam

Grade II*|

* Leeds Civic Hall
* City Museum
* Leeds Central Library
* All Souls' Church
* 1st White Cloth Hall
* Grand Theatre
* Leeds Cathedral
* City Varieties
* Leeds Club
* The Leeds Library
* Memorial to Queen Victoria
* Mill Hill Chapel
* St Pauls House
* Time Ball Buildings
* School of Medicine
* Armley Mills
* HM Prison Leeds
* Round Foundry
* Hunslet Mill

Authority control databases: Geographic |

* Structurae
* MusicBrainz place

|

*[v]: View this template
*[t]: Discuss this template
*[e]: Edit this template