St Pancras Church is a

Greek Revival The Greek Revival was an architectural movement which began in the middle of the 18th century but which particularly flourished in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, predominantly in northern Europe and the United States and Canada, but ...

church in

St Pancras, London St Pancras () is a district in north London. It was originally a medieval ancient parish and subsequently became a metropolitan borough. The metropolitan borough then merged with neighbouring boroughs and the area it covered now forms around ...

, built in 1819–22 to the designs of

William William is a male given name of Germanic origin.Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 276. It became very popular in the English language after the Norman conquest of Engl ...

and

Henry William Inwood Henry William Inwood (22 May, 1794 – 20 March, 1843) was an English architect, archaeologist, classical scholar and writer. He was the joint architect, with his father William Inwood of St Pancras New Church. Biography He was the son of th ...

Location

The church is on the northern boundary of

Bloomsbury Bloomsbury is a district in the West End of London. It is considered a fashionable residential area, and is the location of numerous cultural, intellectual, and educational institutions. Bloomsbury is home of the British Museum, the largest mus ...

, on the south side of

Euston Road Euston Road is a road in Central London that runs from Marylebone Road to King's Cross. The route is part of the London Inner Ring Road and forms part of the London congestion charge zone boundary. It is named after Euston Hall, the family ...

, at the corner of

Upper Woburn Place The A4200 is a major thoroughfare in central London. It runs between the A4 at Aldwych, to the A400 Hampstead Road/Camden High Street, at Mornington Crescent tube station. Kingsway Kingsway is a major road in central London, designat ...

, in the borough of Camden. When it was built its west front faced into the south-east corner of Euston Square, which had been laid out on either side of what was then simply known as the "New Road". It was intended as a new principal church for the parish of St Pancras, which once stretched almost from

Oxford Street Oxford Street is a major road in the City of Westminster in the West End of London, running from Tottenham Court Road to Marble Arch via Oxford Circus. It is Europe's busiest shopping street, with around half a million daily visitors, and as ...

Highgate Highgate ( ) is a suburban area of north London at the northeastern corner of Hampstead Heath, north-northwest of Charing Cross. Highgate is one of the most expensive London suburbs in which to live. It has two active conservation organisati ...

. The original parish church was small ancient building to the north of New Road. This had become neglected following a shift in population to the north, and by the early 19th century services were only held there once a month, worship at other times taking place in a chapel in

Kentish Town Kentish Town is an area of northwest London, England in the London Borough of Camden, immediately north of Camden Town. Less than four miles north of central London, Kentish Town has good transport connections and is situated close to the ope ...

. With the northwards expansion of London into the area, the population in southern part of the parish grew once more, and a new church was felt necessary. Following the opening of the new Church, the Old Church became a

chapel of ease A chapel of ease (or chapel-of-ease) is a church architecture, church building other than the parish church, built within the bounds of a parish for the attendance of those who cannot reach the parish church conveniently. Often a chapel of ea ...

, although it was later given its own separate parish. During the 19th century many further churches were built to serve the burgeoning population of the original parish of St Pancras, and by 1890 it had been divided into 33 ecclesiastical parishes.

History

The Church was built primarily to serve the newly built up areas close to Euston Road, especially parts of the well-to-do district of

. The building of St Pancras church was agreed in 1816. After a competition involving thirty or so tenders, designs by the local architect

William Inwood William Inwood (c.1771 – 16 March 1843) was an English architect and surveying, surveyor, whose most important works including St Pancras New Church and Westminster Hospital were done in collaboration with his sons. Life Inwood was born in ...

, in collaboration with his son

, were accepted. The builder was Isaac Seabrook. The first stone was laid by the

Duke of York Duke of York is a title of nobility in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. Since the 15th century, it has, when granted, usually been given to the second son of English (later British) monarchs. The equivalent title in the Scottish peerage was Du ...

at a ceremony on 1 July 1819. It was carved with a Greek inscription, of which the English translation was "May the light of the blessed Gospel thus ever illuminate the dark temples of the Heathen". The church was consecrated by the Bishop of London on 7 May 1822, and the sermon was preached by the vicar of St Pancras, James Moore. The total cost of the building, including land and furnishings, was £76,679, making it the most expensive church to be built in London since the rebuilding of St Paul's Cathedral. It was designed to seat 2,500 people.

Architecture

The church is in a Greek revival style, using the

Ionic order The Ionic order is one of the three canonic orders of classical architecture, the other two being the Doric and the Corinthian. There are two lesser orders: the Tuscan (a plainer Doric), and the rich variant of Corinthian called the composite or ...

. It is built from brick, faced with

Portland stone Portland stone is a limestone from the Tithonian stage of the Jurassic period quarried on the Isle of Portland, Dorset. The quarries are cut in beds of white-grey limestone separated by chert beds. It has been used extensively as a building sto ...

, except for the portico and the tower above the roof, which are entirely of stone. All the external decoration, including the capitals of the columns is of terracotta. The Inwoods drew on two ancient Greek monuments, the

Erechtheum The Erechtheion (latinized as Erechtheum /ɪˈrɛkθiəm, ˌɛrɪkˈθiːəm/; Ancient Greek: Ἐρέχθειον, Greek: Ερέχθειο) or Temple of Athena Polias is an ancient Greek Ionic temple-telesterion on the north side of the Acropolis ...

and the

Tower of the Winds The Tower of the Winds or the Horologion of Andronikos Kyrrhestes is an octagonal Pentelic marble clocktower in the Roman Agora in Athens that functioned as a ''horologion'' or "timepiece". It is considered the world's first meteorological stati ...

, both in Athens, for their inspiration. The doorways are closely modelled on those of the Erechtheum, as is the entablature, and much of the other ornamentation. Henry William Inwood was in Athens at the time that the plans for St Pancras were accepted, and brought plaster casts of details of the Erechtheum, and some excavated fragments, back to England.

The west end follows the basic arrangement of portico, vestibules and tower established by

James Gibbs James Gibbs (23 December 1682 – 5 August 1754) was one of Britain's most influential architects. Born in Aberdeen, he trained as an architect in Rome, and practised mainly in England. He is an important figure whose work spanned the transi ...

St Martin-in-the-Fields St Martin-in-the-Fields is a Church of England parish church at the north-east corner of Trafalgar Square in the City of Westminster, London. It is dedicated to Saint Martin of Tours. There has been a church on the site since at least the mediev ...

. The octagonal domed ceiling of the vestibule is in imitation of the Tower of the Winds, and the tower above uses details from the same structure. At the east end is an apse, flanked by the church's most original features: two

tribunes Tribune () was the title of various elected officials in ancient Rome. The two most important were the tribunes of the plebs and the military tribunes. For most of Roman history, a college of ten tribunes of the plebs acted as a check on the ...

designed in imitation of the Erechtheum, with entablatures supported by

caryatids A caryatid ( or or ; grc, Καρυᾶτις, pl. ) is a sculpted female figure serving as an architectural support taking the place of a column or a pillar supporting an entablature on her head. The Greek term ''karyatides'' literally means "ma ...

. Unlike those on the Erechtheum, each caryatid holds a symbolic extinguished torch or an empty jug, appropriate for their positions above the entrances to the burial vault. There is a stone sarcophagus behind the figures in each tribune, and the

cornice In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, around the top edge of a ...

s are studded with lion's heads. The caryatids are made of terracotta, constructed in sections around cast-iron columns, and were modelled by

John Charles Felix Rossi John Charles Felix Rossi (8 March 1762 – 21 February 1839), often simply known as Charles Rossi, was an English sculptor. Life Early life and education Rossi was born on 8 March 1762 at Nottingham, where his father Ananso, an Italian from Si ...

, who provided all the terracotta on the building. The upper levels of the tribunes were designed as vestries. Access to the church is through three doorways ranged under the portico. There are no side doors. Inside, the church has a flat ceiling with an uninterrupted span of , and galleries supported on cast-iron columns. The interior of the apse is in the form of one half of a circular temple, with six columns, painted to imitate marble, raised on a plinth. The crypt, which extends the whole length of the church, was designed to contain 2,000 coffins, but fewer than five hundred interments had taken place by 1854, when the practice was ended in all London churches. It served as an air-raid shelter in both world wars and is now used as an art gallery. The church was closed for two years from 1951 for structural renovation made necessary by dry rot and war damage. The North Chapel was added in 1970 and the interior was restored in 1981. The steps of the church were one of several sites used for floral tributes after the

7 July 2005 London bombings The 7 July 2005 London bombings, often referred to as 7/7, were a series of four coordinated suicide attacks carried out by Islamic terrorists in London that targeted commuters travelling on the city's public transport system during the mo ...

. The building in

Grade I listed In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

Today

St Pancras is still in use as a place of worship. The Revd Anne Stevens is the current Vicar. In addition to its regular services it regularly hosts civic services, concerts and talks. Art exhibitions are held in the crypt (www.cryptgallery.org.uk). The

London Festival of Contemporary Church Music The London Festival of Contemporary Church Music is an annual music festival held in London. History The London Festival of Contemporary Church Music was founded in 2002 by Christopher Batchelor at St Pancras New Church. Batchelor remains ...

was established at St Pancras in 2002, and continues (2022) to be based there. The church is one of the most important 19th-century churches in England and is a

Grade I listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

Gallery

Image:St Pancras, London, south elevation, R Waller April 2006.jpg, Caryatid, north elevation Image:St Pancras, London, north elevation, R Waller April 2006.jpg, Caryatids, south elevation Image:St Pancras, London, north elevation 1, R Waller April 2006.jpg, Caryatids, south elevation Image:St Pancras, London, front portico, R Waller April 2006.jpg, Western portico Image:St Pancras, London, Rear View, H Harris 2006.jpg, Exterior of the east end

References

Sources

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External links

Official site
at the Ship of Fools website {{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Pancras New Church Churches completed in 1822 19th-century Church of England church buildings Church of England church buildings in the London Borough of Camden Grade I listed churches in London Diocese of London Greek Revival church buildings in the United Kingdom Buildings and structures in Bloomsbury Anglo-Catholic church buildings in the London Borough of Camden St Pancras, London 1822 establishments in England