The City of London is best known as a financial centre. But among the modern office buildings, it has a surprising wealth of fine churches.
The great fire of London in 1666 destroyed almost every church in the city of London – as well as the old St. Paul’s Cathedral. But out of disaster came opportunity – an opportunity that Sir Christopher Wren seized with both hands. His rebuilding of the city churches left the square mile with some of the best baroque churches in England, and almost all are open to visitors.
A Miniature St. Paul's Cathedral
St. Stephen, Walbrook, just behind the Mansion House, is one of Wren’s masterpieces. The huge central dome, the square plan, and the lighting that comes from all sides, create a luminous internal space. The dome is of lath and plaster, not masonry, enabling the supports to be light; but in essence, this church is what Wren originally intended the architecture of St. Paul’s to look like.
This is the church where vicar Chad Varah founded the Samaritans, offering counselling and friendship to the suicidal. And it also has a controversial altar by Henry Moore, which has been described as ‘an over ripe Camembert’. Other critics believe the circular altar focuses the space created by Wren in a sensitive but modern way.
Wren's Only Gothic Church?
St. Stephen’s shows Wren at his most classical; St. Mary Aldermary, near Mansion House tube station, shows him in a quite different light. Here, he worked in the Gothic style and created a fantasy version of a medieval church. The plasterwork fan vaulting looks like lace, it’s so light. But Wren had, as so often in London, to deal with the old medieval street plan – if you look carefully you can see the chancel is lopsided, because of the angle of the street outside.
St. Brides Fleet Street is still the journalists’ church, from the days when Fleet Street as synonymous with newspapers. The church is best known for its fine ‘wedding cake’ steeple. Look at any sketch of pre-fire London and you’ll see the area was dominated by the spires of the many churches – in adapting the classical style to the Gothic steeple form, Wren was simply giving Londoners back the architecture and the skyline they wanted. The lovely white Portland stone gleams in sunshine, and seems to melt into the sky in winter. The Old Bell tavern next door was the workmens’ hostel and is also said to have been built by Wren.
A Cosmopolitan Church
St. Anne and St. Agnes, near St. Paul’s, shows yet another side of the versatile Wren. It’s built in brick, not stone, and is relatively simple – but again, Wren uses the square ground plan to create a centralised church. Inside, the plan is that of a Greek cross. This is a cosmopolitan church, with Swahili, Amharic, Latvian and Estonian Lutheran congregations, and it’s also a musical church with fine choirs and regular concerts.
Lovers of the picturesque will be attracted to St. Mary at Hill, on a cobbled street off Eastcheap. The church is another square one, with a fine coffered dome – though it had to be restored after a disastrous fire in the 1980s.
Hawksmoor's Only City Church
Wren was a fast worker – he delivered dozens of churches at the same time as rebuilding St. Paul’s. But there’s one baroque church that isn’t by Wren - St. Mary Woolnoth is the work of Nicholas Hawksmoor, possibly England’s most radical architect. Its fused twin towers and rusticated façade suggest bleakness and power. But inside, the effect is quite different; a graceful domed church in which all the light comes from above the massive cornice. Its effect of surprise is truly baroque – almost theatrical, compared to Wren’s calmer style.
Just a few of the city’s Medieval churches remain. St. Olave, Hart Street, near Fenchurch Street station, was the diarist Pepys’s parish church. Dedicated to the holy King Olaf of Norway, its most intriguing monument is the gate to the churchyard, decorated with grinning skulls – immortalised by Dickens as the gate to “St Ghastly Grim.”
Warning - Churches Closed on Sundays!
London’s churches provide an excellent day’s enjoyment for the traveller. But unlike most churches, many are open only during the week when the city is at work – so don't go to these churches on a Sunday!
