ST MICHAELS UNITING CHURCH

A small chapel stood on this site from 1841 following the arrival of the Rev William Wakefield in 1838. Tasmanian merchant and pastoralist Henry Hopkins had asked the Colonial Missionary Society in England for a pastor for the infant settlement of Port Phillip in the 1830s. The present building was designed by the prominent architects Reed and Barnes between 1863 and 1866. The foundation stone was laid by Henry Hopkins on 22 November 1866 and the building was constructed by John Young. The chapel was built in 1966 to mark the centenary of the building. The interior was altered in 1978 when some of the original seats were removed.

The former Independent Church is of architectural, historical and scientific importance to the State of Victoria.

It is architecturally important as an exuberant and outstanding example of Lombardic Romanesque style and one of prominent Victorian architect Joseph Reed's finest buildings. The building is very finely detailed both externally and internally. It is of importance as a particularly early example of the use of polychromatic brickwork in Victoria, and unusual use of the style. Other polychromatic churches in Victoria are Gothic in style. The Independents or Congregationalists were one of the most experimental of the denominations and the use of such an unusual style reflects this independent spirit. The building is also of architectural importance as having a highly formative influence on subsequent polychrome church work, and on polychrome architecture generally in Victoria.

It is the finest example in Victoria of a galleried auditorium type church and is complete with tiered seating arranged in a semicircle around the pulpit. The interior is outstanding, with its semicircular arches on slender iron columns over the half circle gallery, with a domed ceiling above. The spiral gallery stairs are also a notable feature. The auditorium is of importance as having one of the most scientifically acoustic design of any nineteenth century churches in Victoria.

It is an important example of an Independent or Congregational church and is of historical importance for its associations with the Congregational denomination, and as the site of the earliest church of this denomination in Victoria. Established in England during the Puritan movement of dissent from the Church of England, the Congregational denomination was introduced to the colony by early settlers such as John Pascoe Fawkner and John Gardiner. It remained an Independent or Congregational church from the time it was built in 1866-67 until the formation of the Uniting Church in 1977 following an agreement between the Presbyterian, Methodist and Congregational churches in 1971.