Our Lady of Lourdes & St William

Our Church

 Our Lady of Lourdes & St. Williams

Ingleby Road

BD8 9BH Bradford

West Yorkshire

01274 542534

Parish Priest - Fr. Michael Hughes

This inner city church is an important local landmark, built in a stripped Gothic style. The interior retains its spatial quality

with some good fittings.

The Brownroyd area of Bradford grew rapidly during the second half of the 19th century due to the influx of mill workers, many

of them Catholics. In response, the parishes of St Patrick’s and St Cuthbert’s jointly built a school chapel on Bingley Street,

dedicated to St William of York. Mass was first celebrated here in 1882. After a period of closure, the chapel re-opened in 1902

and Fr Patrick MacMahon became the first parish priest in 1909. He developed the present large church and presbytery, built

to designs from Edward Simpson & Son, and dedicated to Our Lady of Lourdes and St William.

Bishop Cowgill laid the foundation stone in 1924.  The church was finally consecrated in 1952 by Bishop Heenan. The sanctuary

was re-ordered in 1971 to designs by D. Chambers, replacing the 1930 fittings. 

In 2014, major renovation of the church was undertaken by Overton Architects, which saw the installation of the altar and

reredos from the recently closed church of The Sacred Heart, Thornton.  At the same time, the statue of St. William, which had

been placed in the school hall for many years, was returned to the church.

The church fronts onto the busy inner ring road and is surrounded by industrial and business premises; it is the only building

of note in the area. 

 In September 2019 the parish was joined with the parish of St Matthew's Allerton and both churches now come under the

                                                                                                                                                                     pastoral area of St. Blaise.