Wren Churches in the City of London

 

A detail of St. Mary-le-Bow

Following on from my exploration of rural Sheffield at Glen Howe Park, Spout House Hill and Brightholmlee, my next day out was undertaken a few days later, during a rare weekend in London to celebrate my mother’s 91st birthday. 

 

A walk around the City of London

 

On my last two visits, I treated myself to a visit to the Tower of London and then a day out in Rochester to look at the castle and cathedral and, this time, my main objective was to explore the remaining parts of London Wall; however, leaving Mansion House underground station and immediately seeing St. Paul’s cathedral and two other churches built after the Great Fire of London in 1666, I realised that Sir Christopher Wren's work would also feature in a very busy day. 

 

The south elevation of St. Mary Aldermary

St. Mary Aldermary (1679–82) is of mediaeval origin and was firstly rebuilt from 1510 to 1629, before burning down in the Great fire. The tower was one of the few parts remaining after the Great Fire, to which Wren added one of the very few churches that were built by him in a Gothic style. 

 

The north elevation of St. Mary Aldermary

With my itinerary for the day already being full, including London’s Roman Amphitheatre, the Museum of London and the church of St. Bartholomew the Great, I just took a few general record photos of its Portland stone masonry and headed up Queen Street to Cheapside, where I couldn’t avoid seeing St. Mary-le-Bow (1670-83), which was badly damaged during the London Blitz. 

 

St. Mary-le-Bow

Growing up in London to the nursery rhyme Oranges and Lemons and knowing that true cockneys are those that were born within the sound of Bow Bells, I had always assumed that this church was sited in the Bow district of east London.

 

The doorway at St. Mary-le-Bow

 

Its English Baroque style is typical of Wren’s work and it again uses Portland stone for the tower, which has a very large west door with an ornate surround, but the remainder is red brick with Portland stone dressings. This church has ancient origins, with only the crypt remaining from its destruction in 1091 by one of the earliest recorded tornadoes in Britain.

 

St. Lawrence Jewry

Continuing up King Street, I then came across St. Lawrence Jewry (1670-86) on Gresham Street, which dates back to the C12 and has an unusual alignment that has been explained by its siting next to the Roman amphitheatre. 

 

The Corinthian portico at St. Lawrence Jewry

After taking a few photographs of the church, including the Corinthian portico at east end, I had a quick look at the remains of the Roman amphitheatre beneath the Guildhall Art Gallery and then made my way along Basinghall Street past the City of London Corporation building until I came to St. Mary Aldermanbury Garden – one of the many city gardens on the site of churches that were destroyed either by the Great Fire or the Blitz, but which were never rebuilt. 

 

St. Aldermanbury Garden

 

First mentioned in 1181, St. Aldermanbury was rebuilt by Wren (1670–74) on the original Grade II Listed footings, provisionally dated to 1437, but it was then totally gutted during the Blitz in 1940. The remains were subsequently removed in 1966 and shipped to Fulton University in Missouri, where they were rebuilt as a memorial to Sir Winston Churchill. 

 

The rebuilt church at Fulton

 

I had been wandering around for only an hour and a half, yet I had already taken nearly 200 photographs of the points of historic interest that can be found everywhere in the City of London. Making my way back to Gresham Street and heading west, the tower of St. Alban in the distance caught my eye and I took another diversion up Wood Street to investigate. 

 

The tower of St. Alban

Set on a small traffic island, surrounded by massive office blocks, the upper part of the Grade II* Listed tower is now in residential use and the home to Point Blank Adventures. It is another another Wren church (1680-87) with ancient origins and a long history of construction and demolition, which concluded in 1966 with the removal of the ruins left from the Blitz in 1940. 

 

The tower of St. Alban

 

Passing the brick built St. Anne and St. Agnes, I arrived at the north-west corner of the old walled city, where I spent an intensive four and a half hours taking several hundred more photographs, before finally resting at the Viaduct Tavern. Once I had recovered from the shock of paying £5.40 for my pint of Fuller's London Pride – delicious as it was - I then headed up Ludgate Hill past St. Martin within Ludgate (1677 to 1684), before arriving back at  Mansion House station,

 

St. Martin within Ludgate