Shrine of Our Lady of Lourdes, Blackpool

The Shrine of Our Lady of Lourdes stands in Whinney Heys Road, Blackpool. The shrine was built between 1955 and 1957 to a design by Francis Xavier Verlarde. During the Second World War Bishop Thomas E. Flynn, the bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Lancaster, prayed to Our Lady of Lourdes, the patron saint of the diocese, to protect the diocese from war damage. By the end of the war it was relatively undamaged, and the bishop conceived the idea of building a thanksgiving chapel to commemorate this.

The shrine was deconsecrated in 1993, and passed into the ownership of the Historic Chapels Trust in 2000. The chapel is constructed in Portland stone and has copper cladding to the roof and flèche. Its plan is nearly rectangular, and it has four bays. At the west end there is single-bay narthex, and at the east end is an apse forming the sanctuary, and projecting vestries. In the west front are double doors over which is a relief frieze of the Holy Trinity by David John.