The site is about 3⁄4 mile (1.2 km) southeast of the town centre, in a field called Picked Acre alongside Boreham Road, which had been given by William Temple of Bishopstrow House in 1859.

[3] The church was designed by London architect George Edmund Street in 1864–1865, in Early English style.

The tiling throughout, reredos, low chancel screen wall, font, pulpit, oak choir stalls and free-standing nave benches were completed before 1868.

The mosaics and opus sectile murals of scriptural scenes on the wall were designed by Charles Ponting and painted by James Powell and Sons in 1911–1915.

These striking turn-of-the-century images are matched by the mosaics of the four archangels on the east wall in the chancel, behind the reredos.