Modern Britain

In around 1920 Emmanuel became a mission district, and in 1934-1935 the permanent church was built beside the temporary one, with aid from local Masonic lodges. The building was very much a product of the thirties, designed by M Travers and T F W Grant, and is of red brick, in a simple Tudor style on the outside, while the interior comprises a chancel, aisled nave, Lady chapel, and vestries. Emmanuel gained its own parish out of All Saints in 1935.

The Bloxhall Institute is on the road of the same name, just a couple of hundred metres south of Emmanuel Church. When Sir Courtenay Warner gifted the church their site for Emmanuel Parish Church, he also donated another site on Bloxhall Road for the purpose of building the institute, a mission which was erected in 1912 and which was run by Emmanuel in collaboration with All Saints Church. The Bloxhall institute closed in around 1956 and was sold in 1959.

The Church of St Catherine & St Paul (The Cornerstone) is in the Forest district of Leyton, wedged between Leytonstone to the south and Upper Walthamstow to the north, with the beginnings of Epping Forest to the east in the form of Wansted. A very modern building which is sited on the corner of Essex Road and Canterbury Road in the streets behind Whipps Cross Hospital, it is a little hard to see a church in its multifunctional design.

The Barclay Christian Centre is on Leyton High Road, at the northern end near Leyton Bus Station. It was founded before 1885 by J G Barclay of Knotts Green (who died in 1898), in a small hall which was built on to the gardener's lodge at Leyton Green. It was originally under the direction of the vicar of St Mary's Church in Leyton when the area around Leyton was being heavily developed with rows of new terraced housing going up.

In around 1896 a London City missioner by the name of A Young was placed in charge of the mission and, shortly before the Barclay family left the district, in about 1898 the hall was given over to the London City Mission. In 1907 a new hall was opened, designed by E Frere. It is a simple but dignified building of yellow brick, and the front has four full-height windows which were fitted originally with louvered shutters. The mission is still active today.