‘A rare surviving example of a Georgian proprietary chapel retaining most of its original early nineteenth century features. Proprietary chapels were a solution to the problem of insufficient capacity within existing parish churches to meet the spiritual needs of a growing 18th and early 19th century urban population ... In its Victorian heyday the chapel regularly had a congregation of between 500 and 600 but during the 20th century numbers continued to fall and in 1973 St John’s was finally closed for public worship ... The Friends of St John’s was founded in 2005 to support the work of The Churches Conservation Trust to promote public awareness of this important Grade I Listed building and encourage greater use of it by the local community. The chapel is used as a venue for a variety of arts and cultural events.’