St Nicholas of Tolentino Church, Bristol

The mission was established in March 1848 by Bishop William Bernard Ullathorne, who purchased a site opposite Lawford's Gate Prison for £1,000. Early worship took place in a temporary chapel near Stapleton Road before the permanent church was established. The location, then considered part of St Philip's or The Dings, was an area of "extreme poverty" heavily populated by Irish Catholic refugees fleeing the Great Famine; this demographic made up the majority of the church's early congregation. The mission was initially entrusted to the Augustinians, with the Rev. Nicholas O'Donnell serving as the first priest. The church was named after the 13th-century Augustinian friar Nicholas of…

The interior features a tall open timber roof with scissor braces. During the 1861 expansion, the nave was furnished with a stone baptismal font carved with emblems of the Four Evangelists and the Sign of the Dove. The project involved the installation of a new main entrance that was created at the east end (the former sanctuary), while the west end of the nave was screened off to create a two-storey church hall with a mezzanine in the former organ space, Following this remodelling, a full-immersion cruciform baptismal pool tiled in mosaic was installed in the nave. The modern nave contains specially commissioned wooden carvings from Malawi, created by the Missionaries of Africa. These…