St Frideswide's Church

By the late 1860s, plans were made to build a dedicated church for the population of Osney Town (now New Osney). Christ Church College, which held the advowson of St Thomas’s parish, provided a triangular site known as “Mrs. Jones’s Field” north-west of Osney Island. The architect Samuel Sanders Teulon was commissioned to design the new church. The foundation stone was laid on 13 December 1870 by John Talbot, MP, at a public ceremony. It was built by the local firm of Honour & Castle and it was originally intended for the church tower to have a spire. The new parish of St Frideswide’s was thereby established, carved out of St Thomas the Martyr parish to serve the Osney and Botley Road…

St Frideswide’s is an example of high Victorian church architecture, notable for its bold and individualistic design by S. S. Teulon. Teulon’s original design was in a Gothic Revival idiom, but with some Romanesque influence evident in its heavy massing and round-arched elements. The church features a crossing tower over the north transept. On one corner of the tower rises a slender octagonal turret which contains a single bell (cast in 1871 by Warner of London). The west front of the church is richly treated, with strong buttresses and a large traceried window. Overall, the exterior design is regarded as one of Teulon’s most powerful and unconventional church designs, now protected by a…

The vicarage is a notable building in its own right. Due to its architectural interest the St. Frideswide’s vicarage is recognized as a Grade II listed building. The vicarage was built by English architect Harry George Walter Drinkwater of Oxford in 1876. Architecturally, the vicarage complements the church with similar materials and Victorian Gothic styling. It is a two-storey house constructed of the same grey Oxford limestone with ashlar trim as the church. The vicarage is linked to the north side of the church by a short covered passage or cloister. Together, the church and its vicarage form a charming historic ensemble along Botley Road, embodying the 19th-century vision of a parish…