Tin tabernacle

Corrugated iron was first used for roofing in London in 1829 by civil engineer Henry Robinson Palmer, and the patent was later sold to Richard Walker who advertised "portable buildings for export" in 1832.

The Church of England, influenced by Pugin, the Cambridge Camden Society and John Ruskin, was initially sceptical about corrugated-iron buildings.

[3] William Morris, founder of the Arts and Crafts Movement, wrote a pamphlet in 1890 decrying the construction of corrugated-iron buildings "that were spreading like a pestilence over the country.

Churches, chapels and mission halls were built in new industrial areas, pit villages, near railway works and in more isolated rural and coastal locations.

David Rowell & Co.'s 1901 catalogue advertised a church to seat 400 persons, delivered to the nearest railway station and erected on the purchaser's foundation, at a cost of £360.

[10] St Margaret's Church from South Wonston, near Winchester, Hampshire, is now at the Weald and Downland Open Air Museum in West Sussex.

[11] Several firms, such as David Rowell & Co., Humphrey's and Frederick Braby in London, Isaac Dixon and Co and Francis Morton in Liverpool, E T Bellhouse in Manchester[12] and A & J Main & Co of Glasgow, manufactured a range of iron buildings that included houses, village halls, sports pavilions, warehouses, hospital wards, chapels and churches.