St John the Baptist church in Bettisfield was designed and built by the acclaimed Victorian architect George Edmund Street at the behest of Sir John Hanmer between 1870 and 1874 in the Gothic Revival style. The church, which stands in open countryside on the edge of the village, is a uniquely individual building given that it is one of only two churches containing fine ceramics, furnishing and fabrics from Street’s specific designs found in Wales.

Designated as a particularly important building of more than special interest, Bettisfield PCC is custodian of the historic textiles and fabrics, and our altar frontals have, for over 140 years, been in daily use and admired by congregation and visitors alike. More recently some of our textiles have been in storage to prevent deterioration. In April 2016, a report was commissioned from The Textile Restoration Studio of Manchester to assess the condition of the fabrics and to produce a conservation plan. It is this plan, which forms the basis of our project to conserve and protect these historic textiles for future generations, also making them available to a wider audience, especially as there are so few examples of Street’s ecclesiastical embroidery in Wales.