The modern Church of All Souls was built in 1956, as a daughter Church to St Paul’s Sketty, and as a memorial to those who laid down their lives in the Second World War. Built mostly from public donation, the building was dedicated by Bishop Glyn Simon on 12th September 1957 and became a parish in 1972.
Hidden between the buildings of Tycoch Road, Hendrefoilan Road and Harlech Cresent, the Church is only visible from the west as you travel down Harlech Cresent towards Tycoch ‘square’. Accessed by a footpath between no.11 and no.13 Harlech Crescent and from the mini roundabout at the junction of Harlech Crescent and Glan yr Afon Road, which leads you to the car park.
The outside walls are plain brown brick with a low pitched roof. An open bell-tower, projecting from the south wall bears a plain stone cross and contains a tenor bell, a replica of the second bell of St Pauls’s Sketty. Above the main entrance is a small stone statue of St. Micheal weighing souls on the Day of Judgement. This figure was not carved in the traditional way but cast in situ from a wooden mould made to the architect’s full size design.
The modern interior is light and airy with walls of plain white plaster and long windows that let the sun stream in. In the words of the late Professor Roy Knight, the church’s historian, All Souls “embodies the qualities the architect sought to achieve – dignity, proportion, simplicity.” In the sanctuary, instead of an east window, an embroidered Christ in Majesty hangs over the altar of silver-grey Scotch marble. There are no side chapels, no carved wood except for the pulpit crucifix or Chi Rho, which is replicated on the simple free-standing altar which allows a west facing position for the celebration of Holy Communion.
In 1982, in celebration of its Silver Jubilee Professor Knight put together a publication ‘The Church of All Souls Tycoch, 1957-1982 and again in 2007, the 50th Anniversary celebrations included the production of ‘All Souls Church – An Open Door: Snapshots and Impressions 1982 – 2007’. Both these publications tell the story of how this Church came to be.
Gower Ministry Area 