We are delighted to announce that Connolly Wellingham have been appointed as Church Architect to St Nicholas, overlooking Bristol Bridge in the heart of the Old City.
A church has stood on this site since the 12thC, with earlier structures incorporating the south gate into the medieval walled city. The majority of the existing structure dates to the 1760s Georgian reconstruction, which was built atop the surviving 15thC vaulted crypt. The nave was gutted during the Bristol Blitz, and subsequently rebuilt and occupied by civic and clerical secular uses from the 1970s. The church was re-opened as a place of worship by the Diocese of Bristol and the Church Revitalisation Trust in 2018 – following an initial phase of refurbishment by our friends at Mal Fryer Architects.
The church is now home to a thriving congregation with ambitions to expand their use of the building and consolidate their identity in the city centre. CWa’s appointment was made after interview of an invited shortlist of practices within the city, and the initial scope of design work is Feasibility Studies in relation to improved access and utilisation of the exquisite medieval crypt space.
