This Grade I listed parish church has probably C12th or C13th walling, there is a window in the south aisle c1300; an early C14th south arcade, north windows to the nave, south porch altered, chancel arch, and details in lower part of tower; C15th upper stage to tower, clearstorey windows and embattled parapets; early C16th south chapel (the Hoo or Lady Chapel), chancel remodelled 1727 for Edward Gilbert of the Bury, restored 1891-5; north-east vestry added 1901, east window opened 1946, chancel colour scheme 1972 by Raymond Erith. Church rooms in churchyard linked to north door 1973-4.
Built of flint rubble with coursed flint facing and stone dressings, the church consists of a chancel and south chapel, higher nave with windows at two levels in the north side, a south aisle, a gabled south porch, and a heavy buttressed west tower on the central axis of the whole building, and a small north-east vestry with gabled corner buttresses. The east end and south chapel are plastered. There is a steep red tile roof to the chancel; a slate roof to the nave, hipped to the east; and flatter pitched metal roofs behind the parapets elsewhere. A pyramid slate roof to the church rooms with deep rendered fascia, band of windows and blue brick base buried in ground.
The chancel has two round-headed small north windows which were its only lighting until 1946. It is of three-bays, plaster-vaulted with stone floor with black dots. The barrel vault has a panelled central ridge, coffered arches on panelled pilasters with moulded impost. There are fielded panels to the lower parts of the walls with windows in the end bays on the north with paterae and garlands in the spandrels. An elaborate memorial plaster panel and eared surround in middle of the south wall has an oval centre, a relief urn with putti and 'EG ob 1762' on the urn.
A central panel on the north wall has an armorial centre and the door to the vestry is discretely inserted below. An elaborate carved wooden reredos fills the east wall with fluted Corinthian pilasters and an arched centre in triumphal arch motif. The segmental pediments to three parts have finials rising above, with putti supporting the ends of the pediments. There is a Lamb and Flag central panel behind altar whilst the central round-headed panel is now a stained glass memorial window of the Crucifixion by Hugh Easton, 1946, given by the surviving members of the Strathmore family in memory of the Earl and his wife.
A painted inscription on the back of the centrepiece of the chancel screen records 'THIS/Chancel was First/Repair'd & Beautifi'd/by EDWARD GILBERT/ESQ of the Bury/in the Year of our Lord 1727.' Edward Gilbert married into the Bowes family of Durham and whose daughter married John Lyon, Earl of Strathmore. This screen is in 'Wedding Cake' Baroque, three bays of dainty columns and arches under the chancel arch, altered to the profile of the chancel vault. It is triple-arched with a higher and wider central opening. Four slender Corinthian columns with separate pieces of entablature are raised on a high panelled plinth with a central wrought iron gate. The stepped tops above the arches have pairs of putti supporting urns with scrolled candelabra and Jacobean finials. The ogee curved upper feature is similar with IHS in a sunburst. Designer unknown.
The tall rectangular nave has a five-bays south arcade c1320 on octagonal piers with moulded caps and bases, two-centred arches of two chamfered orders, and hoodmould with heads. Three ogee-pointed Decorated windows in the north wall are also c1320 each of two trefoil lights with tracery and deep reveals. The pointed north door with segmental rear arch is contemporary. The three clearstorey C15th windows in the north and south walls are of two cinquefoil lights. A narrow upper door for the roodloft is to the right of the chancel arch. The carved wooden pulpit in early C18th style is at the south-east, dated after 1908.
The flat-boarded painted ceiling is divided by a grid of painted battens, with a coved cornice along the side walls and five corbels, as angels with shields, on the east wall; with painted Latin inscription round the edges. The battens are painted as twisted rope, black and white, with the panels alternate red and green all with dark green foliage, the central bosses are shields with IHS. The quote on the eastern edge reads: 'Vidi turbam magnam quam dinumerare nemo poterat alleluia' (Google translate: 'I saw a great multitude which no man was able to number Alleluia') The quotes along the wall edges read: 'Gloria Tibi Jesu' and 'Gloria in excelsis Deo'. (Google Tr: 'Glory to You, Jesus' and 'Glory to God in the highest') The decoration is by Bodley and Garner.
The tall tower arch is of two moulded orders with half-octagonal responds, moulded caps and bases. A wooden gallery is from 1897 placed high up at the west end with access from the ringing chamber.
The south aisle has five-bays, an open timber roof and a raised plinth three-steps higher at the west end with a stone C15th font of octagonal embattled bowl design with a band of leaf carving, an octagonal panelled shaft and a moulded base. The oak cover has an openwork ogee finial. The adjoining south window is of three trefoil lights, Kentish tracery, a moulded rear arch and label, c1300. There is a plain C14th doorway to the east and two C15th three-light windows with cinquefoil lights under segmental heads. A blocked window in the west wall is similar with the tracery of the head exposed externally. In the north-west angle is a narrow four-centred doorway to the tower stair. Varied stone corbels, one a gargoyle, support the inner end of the trusses with wheel-tracery in the spandrels at the north. There are moulded purlins and wallplates.
The south chapel has a similar painted boarded ceiling to the nave, an east window of four cinquefoil lights under a square head, three south windows of three-lights with square heads, and a small four-centred south doorway. The three-bay stone arcade on the north has four-centred arches blocked at mid-depth of the wall, capitals, hexagonal piers with bases cut in the upper parts into half-octagonal shafts with a hollow fillet between. The arch to the south aisle is of similar detail. The simple oak screen at the chapel entrance is C15th with panelled lower part and two-lights on each side of the entrance and gilded transom to the top. Depressed ogee arch to each light and Perp tracery.
Externally the Perp four-lights east window has carved spandrels and moulded strings rising in a V up the gable with descenders and carved stops. Ferramenta to similar windows on south side of chapel. Clunch dressings repaired in plaster. Angle buttress and two buttresses ending below height of window heads.
The gabled south porch has an outer arch of two continuously chamfered orders, stone seats, and restored medieval roof of one bay. Hollow chamfered stone corbels at corners, knee-braces and wallposts to chamfered cambered tie-beams bearing short king-posts with hollow chamfered brace to hollow-chamfered ridge beam. Chamfered end stopped wallplates and flat rafters. South door of two orders continuously moulded. Oak door with moulded battens.
The West Tower is of two stages with large angle buttresses. The west wall extends to the south in a projecting stair turret carried higher than the embattled parapet. Pole and vane on top. The C14th west doorway is of two continuous hollow chamfered orders. There are narrow plain lancets to three sides high up in ground stage with a two-light quatrefoil headed bell opening on each side, and openings at five levels on the west side. Moulded plinth to stair turret and buttresses but not to the tower. The lowest C14th west window is a single trefoil light, rebated for an internal shutter, and holds a rare survival, an early C14th stained glass window of the Virgin and Child, the Virgin mostly brown and green has lost her face, the Child is draped in red. There is a ring of six bells in the tower hung anti-clockwise for ringing in the English style
Words variously from British Listed Buildings, Pevsner's Hertfordshire Buildings, Simon Jenkins' England's Thousand Best Churches, all amended and added to with own on-site observations.
Co-ordinates are for the south porch.