Newcastle, Whickham View, St Bede's RC Church

Built in the 1950s to serve a housing estate, this is a modest design with some typical features of its time.

The parish was erected in 1937 to serve an area of new housing. The present church was built in 1958 from designs by E.A. Gunning. It has since been altered.

The orientation has been turned through forty five degrees, so that ritual east is actually facing south; this description follows conventional liturgical orientation. In order to keep the church on the same level as its approach, concrete piers support the building. The church walls are finished in roughcast cement render, while the roof is covered in single-membrane PVC. The nave windows project in oriel fashion, so that the eaves have a zig-zag plan and the resulting projections rise to meet tapered sloping roofs. A simple elongated pyramid flèche stands on a short rod over the ridge of the sanctuary. There is a short sloping path down to the west narthex, with a projecting canopy over double doors.

Inside, the roof has a shallow parabolic profile with recessed diagonally-ribbed plaster coffering over the sanctuary. The inward-tapering ambo of dark stone is raised on two steps, while a third leads to the altar of similar stone and the snecked stone canted support for the central tabernacle. A timber-clad font with wide timber cover stands below the sanctuary steps. The pews are well made, with back rails and solid ends.