Church of St John of Jerusalem

Very little remains above ground of the once great priory church of St John of Jerusalem. The church has had a very colourful history being owned by many different religious and secular groups. St John of Jerusalem was founded by an order of solider monks who built forts and hospitals in the holy land in the year 1145 when ten acres of land was given to them near Clerkenwell just outside the city the London. It was here where they built their priory church, the design of the church was similar to the Temple church off fleet street having a round nave and small rectangular chancel. St Johns also had a crypt beneath the chancel which survives to this day. The priory church was built chiefly in the twelfth century but with some later additions with the nave being replaced with a more conventional rectangular one. Later a tower was added in the north west corner of the building. 

In 1381 Wat Tyler on his way to Smithfield to meet the king during the Peasants Revolt set fire to the church. The building was quickly rebuilt afterwards and continued to be used by the the order until the dissolution of monasteries. The dissolution in 1540 dissolved the order of St John and demolished all structures except the chancel. 

After the destruction of the dissolution the church was used for secular use becoming an office, the Master of the Revels which licensed plays including those of Shakespeare. The building was however quickly reverted back to religious use as a chapel and in the early eighteenth century it is recorded as being a Presbyterian meeting house. In 1721 it was bought and was mostly rebuilt giving it much the appearance it has today. In the late nineteenth century at the church above was 'restored' by the Victorians taking out many Georgian additions. From the same restoration project the twelfth century under the chancel was restored and cleaned and converted into a chapel. The church became the parish church of St John for some years until 1921 when it was given to the new order of St John of Jerusalem who used it as their chapel. During the Second World War the church was badly bombed, by the end of the war it was left a blackened shell. The order of st John restored and rebuilt the church afterwards, although not to original designs. One new positive feature is the cloister garden built in the 1950's. 

Unfortunately the church today is in my view a rather ugly mess of restoration and post war rebuilding. However, the twelfth century crypt (pictured left ©) survived the disasters inflicted on the church and is one of the most atmospheric and authentic medieval crypts in London and is well worth a visit. Another remnant of the priory church is St Johns gate which was originally the gateway to the priory. St Johns gate is just to south of the church on the road to Smithfield. 

First Picture © showing church post-war plans for the church. More information including opening hours at http://www.museumstjohn.org.uk/your_visit/index.html

Brief history of St Olave

This small medieval gem in the heart of the city of London has managed to retained an atmosphere of a country parish church. The church of St Olave's which stands on Hart street is dedicated to king Olave of Norway for his assistance against the Danish invaders in which he pulled down old London bridge thus stopping them from entering the city. This puts the start of the churches history over 1000 years ago just before the Norman conquest. The earlier church was mostly rebuilt in Perpendicular Gothic some time in the fifteenth century in which most of the current church dates, although there are some thirteen century fragments from the older church. The only other major alteration in its early history was the rebuilding of the top half of the tower which was rebuilt in brick on top of the earlier tower in the eighteen century. 

The church escaped the great fire due to a quick thinking of the diarist Samuel Pepys and local resident William Penn Senior who ordered the destruction of surrounding buildings to create a fire break which stopped the fire spreading to the church. However, it did not escape damage during the second Great fire during the Second World War when it received a direct hit leaving it a gutted shell. Whilst it underwent restoration the parish was moved to the nearby site of All Hallows staining where a temporary nave was built. The church was reopened after a long restored in 1954. Although it was badly damaged in the war it has been relevantly sensitively restored and it has managed to keep its medieval charm.

The church has many interesting features of note the first is the thirteenth century crypt which has managed to survive without much alteration or destruction. Another interesting feature is the vestry door is thought to be from the previous building dating from the thirteenth century. The graveyard also has an interesting history, it was raised up from street level in 1665 to bury the dead of the 1665 great plague, this is marked by the entrance arch to the church yard displaying 

Paul Pinders house

This house of a rich merchant stood on Bishopsgate since it was built around 1599 to its destruction for the expansion of Liverpool Street Station. It was built for the merchant Paul Pinder as a mansion outside the city walls on Bishopsgate due to its proximity to the city and his commercial interests but also due to its space which allowed him to have a large garden to the rear. What was built in 1599 was a new bay between two older properties to the left and right (Buildings to the left and right in the picture left made up the complex of the mansion). The building survived the Great fire of London but afterwards (after the death of Paul Pindar in 1650) was sub-divided and given over to the London work house. The house was demolished in 1890 for the eastern extension of Liverpool street station. There were many similar houses with impressive projecting jetties in medieval London but even then this house would have been striking. Its elaborate work carvings were meant to show off the wealth of the merchant. 

Its former location is now taken up by a large modern office building, (it would have been where the large arch is on the Bank of Scotland building on Bishopsgate). When it was demolished the facade was acquired by Victoria and Albert Museum in the interest of saving some of the vanishing medieval heritage of the city. The bottom of the facade was not retained due to the various alterations. 

1-3 Hare Court - middle temple lane

This row of interesting buildings of Hare court on middle temple lane I found on my way to the Temple Church. They may not be strictly 'medieval' being built in seventieth century but their scarcity and appearance I feel entitles them to a post. 

The set of three buildings are of the late seventeenth century being built around 1693. They were probably built by the lawyers of the middle temple for offices or perhaps residential quarters (I'm not sure on this). They appear to have miraculously survived the blitz in which so much of the temple area was devastated (which is evident from looking around the temple area at dates on the buildings which are mostly reconstructions).

The buildings themselves have little detail being a nondescript mass of white plastering interrupted by rows sash windows. The central building has on the upper floor weatherboarding which was a common material to use on a facade of a building of this date, the others could have originally also been faced like this. They are timber framed and the upper floors have a overhanging jetty to get the most space out of a modest building plot. They are all two star listed by English Heritage probably due to there rarity and survival in central London.  

Staple Inn

When one walks down High Holborn today between the many modern office blocks there lies a curious fragment of the old medieval street in the form of the picturesque Staple Inn. This half timbered Inn gives an impression of High Holborn before the great fire and redevelopment in seventeenth century when it would have been lined with many similar buildings. The front facade is part of a larger complex of buildings including a hall built around a courtyard to the rear (although most of the other buildings were destroyed during the last war). The current front facade consists of two buildings, one was the original staple Inn (5 bays to the left), the other was a house of similar age (2 bays to the right). The distinction between the two is more evident on the early image left as during restorations the house was incorporated with the inn creating a larger front facade. The 5 bay Staple Inn was built in 1585 and was established as an 'inn of Chancery' which was a medieval school providing training in legal practices. The inn was also a wool staple where wool was weighed and taxed, which gives the inn its name. Staple Inn was once attached along with neighbouring Barnards Inn to Grays Inn, one of the four inns of courts. These 'partnerships' with larger law firms was common to many of the other inns of court and minor inns of chancery. The Staple Inn survived the great fire along with much of the Holborn area but took much damage during the second world war which was subsequently repaired.

As can be observer in the picture of 1880 above left the building was once covered by extensive plaster which obscured the original facade. This was removed during a restoration by Alfred Waterhouse relieving the semi-preserved original facade, Waterhouse also designed the opposite prudential assurance building. In his restoration of 1886 he removed many of the post-medieval alterations but overall was generally sympathetic. The building was again restored in 1937 on the eve of war, although this time it was much less-sympathetic with it being extensively rebuilt in part. Much of the visible woodwork dates from this restoration and only some Tudor elements actually survive. 

Just a few years after the restoration the Inn came under attack from German air raids which caused some damage to the building. However, a later air raid in 1944 was the most destructive in which the courtyard and the old hall were destroyed. The Inn was subsequently restored and remains a attractive example of a timber framed building once common in London. It is one of the most popular and heavily photographed buildings on the High Holborn road due to its striking difference from other dull buildings on the road. Architectural historian Nikolaus Pevsner described the building as being 'no doubt the most impressive surviving example of timber building in London'. 

Hall   

Behind the facade of High Holborn through the Holborn gateway (through a ground floor passageway) is Staple inn courtyard with the staple inn hall on the opposite side of the courtyard. The old hall was built around 1580 as a banqueting hall. The building is of a basic design with a iconic hammer beam roof like many other great banqueting halls in medieval London. However, this hall is neither as significant nor as big as other halls in London. 

The courtyard on which the hall sits was a undisturbed historic and peaceful oasis in the centre of London until in 1944 the courtyard was hit by a flying German bomb. The hall was completely destroyed, although luckily the inn front was not too badly damaged. The oasis was restored along with a rebuilt hall, built as close as the original as possible and was reopened in the 1950's.


As is demonstrated on the two images left (before and after) the reconstruction was a close copy of the original. In my opinion the reconstruction was a success as the interior too which often loses atmosphere with reconstructions is maintained closely to the original. The picture on the left © shows the hall in 1880 whilst the picture on the bottom left © shows the hall today (2012).   

229&230 Fleet Street

These two adjacent timber framed buildings in the heart of London in Fleet Street are curious survivors of destruction and redevelopment London has seen. The two buildings must have come under joint ownership at some point as they are two separate buildings which have been restored in similar fashion around the nineteenth century. Most people wouldn't give these buildings a second glance, not being as impressive and as obviously old as the Inner temple gateway slightly further down the street.  

The first, 229 fleet street (right on image) was constructed in the early seventeenth century in 1625. It is an elegant medieval townhouse built on four stories with a projecting jetty from the second floor fitted with sash windows, probably inserted when altered in the nineteenth century. The ground floor is much altered with the addition of Victorian shop front. Above the door there is a small plaque commemorating its rare survivor of the great fire of London. The building is listed 2* by English heritage for its age and the rare survival of a jetty. 

230 fleet street (left on image) is a late seventeenth century townhouse with ground floor shop. The building has a full width bay with sash windows which follows the building from the first floor upwards. Although in my view less interesting than 229, this building is listed as Grade 1 by English heritage as a building of the high importance. 

These two buildings are the only survivors from the medieval townhouses which would have once lined Fleet street and are also perhaps the only survivors of London's once plentiful collection of timber framed seventeenth century townhouses. These two managed to survive the Victorian and Edwardian schemes of clearance which destroyed buildings of a similar antiquity and style in the area in streets such as Wych street.

If you want to learn more about fleet street and its development why not take a walking tour by visiting: http://www.unrealcityaudio.co.uk 

74 Leadenhall street

This building which stood on 74 Leadenhall street is an quite an enigma as there is very little record of its existence and its destruction. The building dated from sometime in the seventeenth century and was one of the many timber framed buildings built at this time. One of the few records we have is by architectural historian Nikolaus Pevsner who described  it briefly only in his introduction as one of the few timber framed seventeenth century buildings left in London. There is surprising little information about this building despite areas of interest, its age and also some distinguishing features such as the bay window and some interesting interior work.  

From various sources it appears that the building survived the Second World War and early post-war redevelopment. It is recorded in Pevsner's book which was published in 1957 and also in the image above dating to 1967. Intriguingly the brief description of the building is not altered in Pevsner's 1973 revised edition perhaps suggesting it was still surviving,  however this is uncertain. I would have thought such a building would have been conserved as late as the 1970's (although much demolition in Britain still continued at this time), however land value in the city was increasingly rapidly and it would have been fairly low density compared to a large office building its in place. 


From street level the building is quite unnoticeable and admittedly isn't too handsome. The facade  must have been substantially altered in the nineteenth century when the brick work around the bay was perhaps constructed to its appearance in the image above ©. The bay looks original and is probably part of a older facade. Also the roof is slightly usual being hipped which may also indicate that the building is older than parts of the front facade. The interior of the building was noted for having a interesting ceiling of on the first floor, as a handful of images exist highlighting its interior, although they say little else about the building. Now in its place is a group of modern office buildings perhaps dating to the 1980's which may give an insight to when the building was lost. 





left is an image of the interior showing part of the ceiling work. Source: The guildhall art gallery archives ©

St Ethelburga

This ancient city church squeezed between two large office buildings on the busy road of Bishopsgate has been in existence for over 800 years. It was probably founded sometime in the 13th century and was dedicated to the Saxon abbess of barking, St Ethelburga the virgin. Some of the building dates to the 1390's including the main doorway arch. Above the doorway the large window is from the fifteenth century. In the later medieval period the church constructed a porch with a shop to raise funds for the parish, pictured left ©. The shop projected out into the street and obstructed the facade of the church giving it from the street a picturesque appearance. The shop was demolished in the 1930's for a road widening scheme. The entrance doorway can be found in the museum of London which dates to the fifteenth century. In several older images the church the building is depicted as having a spire on top of the small tower. The spire must have been demolished or destroyed before 1775 when a bell turret was added with a seventeenth century weather vane on the top.

The church survived the great fire and so made up a large cluster of medieval buildings around Bishopsgate (most redeveloped in Victorian period apart from churches of St Helena and St Andrews). The church also luckily escaped much damage in the bombing of the Second World War making it only one of a handful to have avoided destruction of both events. 

Architectural Historian Pevsner uses the word 'humble' twice in his relatively small extract of the building in his guides. 'Humble' is however a very good description as it was indeed a very small church and smaller than most in the city. The church is a reminder of what many of the city medieval parish churches once looked like before the great fire which destroyed so many. The survival of the church is almost unique, most other surviving medieval churches are larger.  

The interior was rather insignificant being as humble as the exterior. Of note were the Flemish fifteenth stained glass window as well as other English seventeenth century glass work (Both Lost). The inside of the church consisting of only a south aisle and a nave giving it a shape of a small rectangle. The church like many was restored in the Victorian era, although with mostly only the addition of furnishings. 

However despite so much history, this humble piece of medieval London was ultimately destroyed in 1993 in a massive IRA bomb left ©. The bomb reduced much ancient structure to rumble, only the south arcade and east wall survived intact. The church had survived the great fire, the blitz and redevelopment only to be destroyed in the modern era. It being destroyed so recently makes one think how the protection of our ancient buildings is not guaranteed. The bomb also damaged the nearby church of St Helena Bishopsgate as well as devastating much of Bishopsgate.

The story would have stopped there if some people in the church had got their way. They proposed to clear the site and sell the land for redevelopment but the discovery that the south aisle and east window survived and a public outcry led to the rebuilding of the church. In 2002 the long reconstruction project came to an end and the church was reopened as a centre for peace and reconciliation. Of the 3 million pounds it cost to rebuild the Clothworkers company contributed 1.2 million to the project. The rest of the money was collected from a variety of sources from individual donations to the heritage lottery.  

It was incredible that the facade was rebuilt closely to the original when these days architects like making great distinctions between the old and the new, in one proposal one of these architects wanted to replace the facade with glass but was quickly dropped due to its insensitive nature. The building today offers a haven in the centre of the busy and noisy commercial district, if not rebuilt the church would have only been replaced by characterless dull office block. It also helps to give a sense of the original scale of the street, where once the church was the tallest building it is now the smallest, the street being dominated by ever more high rise office blocks. left how the church looks today, a tribute to the determination of people to maintain the cities medieval heritage.

Brief history of Southwark Cathedral

Southwark cathedral is one of London's oldest Gothic buildings and is one of the few churches in London of the early English style (only other example is the temple church which is of a transitional period). It began life as a priory founded in 1106 by two Norman knights known as St Mary's Overie, The latter part of the name meaning St Mary's over the water (to London). In 1212 there was a devastating fire and the priory was mostly rebuilt in the early English Gothic style. After the dissolution of the monasteries the church was renamed St Saviour and remained royal property until it was bought by a group of merchants in 1611. It was a parish church since the reformation and a cathedral since 1905. 

The new London bridge of the 1830's played a pivotal role in the history of the cathedral. The bridge committee wanted to demolish the entire church and rebuild it smaller further west as London bridge was moved closer to the church. However, after much debate and persuasion the decision was finally taken to restore the church. Despite the church being saved it would lose much of its medieval fabric, first the lady chapel (to the east of the church) was demolished for the new approach to London bridge and also in the 1830's the nave was pronounced unsafe. By the early nineteenth centuey most of the church was in a poor state and at risk of collapse. Its savior was the young George Gwilt who strengthened the tower in 1818 and in 1821 restored the chancel and the retro-quire. The crumbling thirteenth century nave was in dire need of restoration, although it was decided to demolish it instead, using a unorthodox method of demolition they took off the roof leaving it exposed to the elements for 8 years. After the nave had degraded to a ruinous state they blew what remained of it up. They then employed Henry Rose to build a Gothick (not a misspelling) nave which so horrified people no records of its design were kept and it was demolished in less than a century. In 1890 the present nave was completed by Sir Arthur Bloomfield, as a close copy to what once stood for hundreds of years in an early English style. 

The building has fragments from each period of medieval architecture in England. In the wall of the north transept are fragments of the original Norman monastery. The church is dominated by the Early English style which is evident in the chancel and the retro-quire (and the old nave). The two most distinguishing features of the church are the early English retro-quire and the Triforium (pictured left- {the arcade of arches underneath the windows}). It also has some of the Decorated style which is evident in the south transept. The church also displays the late Gothic style of Perpendicular in the tower which was built around 1400 after rebuilding from a small fire in the 1390's. Also in the church is the Victorian Gothic revival style in the nave and extensions on the north and south transepts. Although it does not have the character and age of the medieval fabric the rebuilding on the inside at least has been generally sympathetic. On the outside however, the building has been much more altered, most obviously with the black flit covering which was added in the late nineteenth century restoration. 

The George Inn

The George inn is one of London’s many relics from its medieval past. Although built in the late seventeenth century it is similar in design and function to many Inns which of the medieval city. The George Inn is tucked away off Borough high street south of the river. It was rebuilt in 1676 after a fire destroyed much of the south bank. It remains now the last galleried coaching Inn in London and only one of two coaching inns left. It would have originally stood in an area with many similar Inns on the approach to London however over the years they have been slowly removed mostly by the railway companies who also almost destroyed the George. Although the Inn was not lost like many others, two of the Inns sides and much of the back of the building were taken down to build a goods warehouse leaving only the south side (shown above left) of the inn as authentic. 

The building is listed grade one by English heritage as it is a rare example of the old coaching inns which would have once been common through-out London. The George inn is almost unique in having managed to escape the bulldozers which flattened most of the cities coaching inns. The inn is now maintained and conserved by the National Trust, although it is far from a museum with a lively pub on the ground floor. The best example of a London coaching Inn was the Oxford arms which was sadly demolished in the Victorian era.