Architecture
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It was designed by the self-made architect Walter Douglas Campbell, and built in 1881-6; with renovation in 1906.The heavy oak beams in the cloister are believed to have come from the (then) recently broken up wooden battleships, HMS Caledonia and HMS Duke of Wellington.An eccentric blend of church styles, from ancient Roman to Norman,it is built of local stone. It consists of a nave and chancel, with the chancel-stalls being canopied.
St Conan’s Kirk, Church of Scotland, is located in Loch Awe, Argyll and Bute, Scotland. It is situated on a crag high above the water amid vegetation which includes roses, honeysuckle, and ivy, and is surrounded by large trees. It was established as a chapel of ease by the Campbells of Innis Chonan. St Conan's Tower is 0.5 miles (0.80 km) away. It is renowned for the fragment of bone that is rumoured to have come from Robert the Bruce, King of Scotland.
An extraordinary early 20th century church on the shore of Loch Awe, built by Walter Douglas Campbell, brother of the 1st Lord Blythswood, and incorporating fragments of carving from Iona.
Campbell began building a small cruciform church here in 1881, situated where the nave of the current church stands. This was complete by 1886. But it was not long before Campbell decided to create something far more elaborate and grandiose. In 1907 he began a much larger, more ornate building, and entirely rebuilt the earlier structure. Campbell died in 1914 and the work was carried on by his sister Helen. Then she died in 1927, so it was not until 1930 that the building was finally consecrated
The Bruce Chapel One of the most intriguing features of the church is the Bruce Chapel, dominated by a larger-than-life effigy of King Robert Bruce, with the hands and face made of alabaster and the remainder carved from wood.
The first abbey was established at Peterborough (originally called Medeshamstede) in 655 AD and largely destroyed by Viking raiders in 870. In the mid 10th century a Benedictine Abbey was created from what remained, with a larger church and more extensive buildings. The abbey's ancillary buildings were destroyed in Hereward the Wake's resistance to the Norman takeover in 1069, but the church survived until an accidental fire swept through it in 1116.
The present building was begun in 1118, consecrated in 1238 and the structure of the building remains essentially as it was on completion. Most significantly the original wooden ceiling survives in the nave, the only one of its type in this country and one of only four wooden ceilings of this period surviving in the whole of Europe, having been completed between 1230 and 1250. It has been over-painted twice, but retains its original style and pattern.
The main beams and roof bosses of the tower date back to the 1370s and those of the Presbytery to 1500. The renewal of the Presbytery roof coincided with an extensive building programme which included the processional route provided by extending the East End of the church. This 'New Building' is an excellent example of late Perpendicular work with fine fan vaulting probably designed by John Wastell, who went on to work on Kings College Chapel in Cambridge.
In 1539 the great abbey of Peterborough was closed and its lands and properties confiscated by the king. However to increase his control over the church in this area he created a new bishop and Peterborough Abbey church became a Cathedral.