Fairwater Independent Chapel was brick built in 1959 (the 1:1250 OS mapping of 1959 appears to show the outline of foundations, but building not completed).
A Western Mail article of 6th May 1959 reported that the partially-completed church had been broken into by a band of youths who caused considerable damage to the building; damage included pouring waterproofing liquid onto floors and walls which then needed to be stripped out and replaced. The article states that the church was built by a group of volunteers who had spent their leisure time building the new church; the dedication ceremony, which had been due to take place on the 30th May, had to be postponed.
The opening ceremony finally took place on the 26th September 1959, a year after the first turf was cut on the site. It was opened by Rev. Ivor Cassam, pastor of New Trinity Congregational Church, Cardiff and Dedication Service was led by Rev. W Griffith Jones, Moderator of the Wales and Monmouthshire Provinces of the Congregational Union. (Western Mail, 28th September 1959)
The double-height chapel is brick built in the Modernist style; externally of yellow brick gable ends, each with a central bay of brown brick set with a pattern of Greek crosses formed from advanced yellow bricks. The side elevations are white-rendered, with full-height, flat-headed windows with simple decorative architraves. A single-storey, flat-roofed section wraps around the eastern end of the building, providing a porch entrance on the south side. Internally, the main auditorium is a simple rectangular room with a bay at the west end providing a focal space for worship demarcated by a stepped raise in floor level and a decorative beam with further Greek crosses suspended on wrought-iron rods. Simple metal cross to rear wall. Plain rendered walls, wooden parquet floor, recessed ceiling, the central bay of which is decorated with moulded timber, the outer step with plaster Greek crosses.
The name ChristChurch was probably added with the amalgamation of congregations with the Christchurch Independent Chapel, formerly on Hazleurst Road, Llandaff North which closed in 1995.
Fairwater Christchurch closed in 2019 and in 2024 it was reported that the building would be demolished to make way for housing development.
RCAHMW, December 2024