[1] Its dedication is a medieval Scottish version of Saint Saviour's.

[2][3] The parish was founded in 1856 as one of the missions to the poorer areas of the city by Alexander Penrose Forbes (Bishop of Brechin and previously a student at Oxford at the height of the Oxford Movement),[4] specifically the mill-workers of the town's Hilltown area.

Worship was originally held in the upper floor of the 1857 parish school building, also designed by Bodley and contemporary with his St Michael's, Brighton, with the nave of the permanent church only added in 1865-1868 and a chancel in 1874.

[4][2][1] Its ceiling paintings are by Frederick Leach,[5] whilst the friezes on the chancel arch, the reredos (showing an Annunciation and Crucifixion flanked by the Virgin Mary and John the Evangelist surrounded by the eleven post-Easter apostles and Paul of Tarsus) and much of the stained glass in the building are by Burlison and Grylls.

[1] Originally done in tempera, the interior decorations were repainted in oil colours in 1907 and 1936 before a restoration in 1969-1977 which won a Scottish Civic Trust award.