St Columba's Church, Elgin

St Columba's Church is a fairly modern church, built in the early 20th century. It is located on the south side of Elgin in a fairly discreet location. Access is by a narrow side street and the street is set far back from the street, in enclosed grounds. A new church hall stands alongside the church and there is no associated graveyard with St Columba's. 

The church is aligned approximately east-west and has a traditional layout and is a mixture of Norman and Gothic styles. It was built with tooled, roughly-finished (bull-faced) sandstone blocks with ashlar corner stones (quoins) and window/door surrounds. The steeply-pitched roofs are all slated. The church comprises a tall nave, a southern side aisle and a north vestry and session house. 

The nave of St Columba's Church is a tall, narrow and fairly long structure. The east and west gables each have a group of three large pointed-arch (lancet) windows, each with side pilasters, chamfered margins and shallow hoodmoulds. Small, square panes of leaded glass are used, with some stained glass. Wide buttresses are positioned close to the corners. The ends of the skews are gableted and there are small stone cross finials on the gable apexes. Towards the wallheads of the north and south side elevations are quite large clerestory windows, which are pointed-arched and have larger square panes of glass. 

The large south aisle has a double-pitch roof and a single buttress towards the west end. In the west gable is a fine round-arch doorway, the main entrance into the church. It has a series of three pilasters with excellent carved capitals, from which spring simply-carved arches over the doorway. The wooden double doors are set back from the doorway to create a porch area. Above this doorway is a round-arched recess or niche, similar in appearance to those found in medieval churches and cathedrals, which often used to hold statues. There is a small cross finial on the apex of the aisle's gable. The side elevation of the aisle has small, narrow round-arched windows, a single large, stepped buttress and three much smaller buttresses. Attached to the aisle at the east end is a tall aisle with a small lean-to side doorway. There is a single pointed-arch window in the south-facing gable. 

On the north elevation, attached to the west end, is a vestry and session house, housed in a small aisle. It has a round-arched doorway and two small round-arched windows in the west face. 

The interior of St Columba's feels older than it actually is, mainly due to the exposed stone walls and Norman-style arcading between the nave and aisle. The layout is typically Norman too, with the nave and aisle leading to the chancel at the east end. The wooden roof structure is left exposed and is supported on stone corbels in the walls. 

The nave and aisle have simple wooden pews with a central passage. At the east end of the nave, close to the chancel, is the oldest feature of the church. It is a very fine, large pulpit, dating from the 17th century. It was taken from the old St Giles church before it was demolished and rebuilt and is dated 1684. It is hexagonal and made of wood, which is richly carved in places. It has a tall backboard and a large canopy above. 

The chancel has tall round-arches leading to the side aisle and organ chamber. The chancel is unlike most Church of Scotland layouts in that the communion table resembles a high altar and is raised on steps, more typical of Catholic or Episcopal churches. There are wooden choir stalls, which face each other across a central clearing. The east end of the chancel is separated from the rest of the church by low walls and steps lead up to the wooden communion table against the east gable. There is a stone reredos behind with painted panels, in which are statues of Christ and angles. The fine stained glass windows in the chancel were made by M C Webster. A wooden, round-ended lectern is used by the minister rather than the pulpit and there is also a large stone font. The pipe organ in its chamber is from St Paul's Church in Perth and was installed in St Columba's in 1990.