GREAT CHURCHES OF LONDON

Renowned photographer Derry Brabbs delves into the dim recesses of 42 London churches to bring us the gasp-out-loud architectural splendour and the fascinating details we might well not notice for ourselves. The great fire of 1666 changed the face of the City completely, giving the opportunity for Christopher Wren, together with his assistant Nicholas Hawksmoor, to create masterpiece after masterpiece. Among the relatively few medieval churches to survive the conflagration was St Bartholomew the Great which gives its name to the nearby Bart's Hospital. Founded in 1123 as a thank-offering by a courtier of Henry I, the magnificent centre of the church has Romanesque arches, while the aisles are adorned with art from both the medieval and modern periods, including Damien Hirst's controversial statue of St Bartholomew. Also from the Romanesque period, the Temple Church is one of the country's rare round churches. St Katharine Cree on Leadenhall Street was one of many monastic churches dissolved by Henry VIII and the 1628 rebuilding was dedicated by Archbishop William Laud, a supporter of Charles I who, like the King, was later condemned to execution. St Stephen's Walbrook was Wren's own church and is justly famed as a baroque masterpiece, creating an illusion of depth and space in restricted area. A notable Hawksmoor church is St Mary Woolnoth, with an underground station sign on its facade and the pillars of its square box interior set off by intricate gold-leaf scrolling. Among the glories of Victorian Anglo-Catholic architecture is All Saints' Margaret Street, built by William Butterfield with later decorative additions by Ninian Comper, while at St Augustine's Kilburn the leading neo-Gothic architect J. L. Pearson created a vaulted chancel unrivalled in its majestic design and decoration. Lutyens's St Jude on the Hill in Hampstead Garden Suburb heralds a new century, and the fortress-like St Saviour, Eltham, is unmistakably of the 1930s, while the Lumen United Reformed church on Tavistock Place continues 20th century austerity with its conical glass chapel and stunning resurrection window. 272 pp, colour photos on every page.