St Matthew's Church, Silverhill

St Matthew's Church
The church from the northwest, showing the tower stump (right)
50°51′56″N 0°33′20″E / 50.8656°N 0.5556°E / 50.8656; 0.5556
Location	St Matthew's Road, Silverhill, Hastings, East Sussex TN37 6PD
Country	United Kingdom
Denomination	Church of England
Churchmanship	Conservative Evangelical
Website	www.stmatts.co.uk
History
Status	Parish church
Founded	21 September 1860
Founder(s)	Rev. John Cumberlege; Sarah Waldegrave, Countess Waldegrave
Dedication	Matthew
Architecture
Functional status	Active
Heritage designation	Grade II*
Designated	14 September 1976
Architect(s)	George Voysey (first church); John Loughborough Pearson (present building)
Style	Early English Gothic
Completed	1861 (first church); 1884 (present building)
Administration
Province	Canterbury
Diocese	Chichester
Archdeaconry	Archdeaconry of Hastings
Deanery	Rural Deanery of Hastings
Parish	St Matthew, Silverhill

St Matthew's Church is an Anglican church in the Silverhill suburb of Hastings, a town and borough in the English county of East Sussex. The present building, a large brick structure of 1884 by ecclesiastical architect John Loughborough Pearson, replaced a much smaller church founded in 1860 when Silverhill began to grow from an agricultural area with scattered cottages into a suburb of the increasingly fashionable seaside resort of Hastings. Although a planned tower was never built, the "imposing" church dominates its steeply sloping site; and although its architect—a leading Gothic Revivalist—considered it one of his lesser works, it has been described as "outstanding" and "architecturally inventive". English Heritage has listed the building at Grade II* for its architectural and historical importance.