London Rooms: St. George's Bloomsburry Church

St. George's Bloomsburry built between 1716-1730, is a site of political/architectural mayhem, ultimately designed by the renowned architect Nicolas Hawksmoor.

The Architect:

Nicholas Hawksmoor(1661-1736) was a English architect, born in Nottinghamshire at Ragnall. Hawksmoor didn't come from a privileged back ground like the other famous architects of that time. He designed several beautiful churches and is known for his unique eye for details. His very original church designs are baroque in their monumentality and sense of mass. His work ranged from small architectural details to ambitious urban plans, from new parish churches to work on the monument of his age. Critics of the time found his work to be a bit of a mish mash and repetitive.

Introduction & History of the site:

St. Georges Bloomsburry

Due to the rapid development in the Bloomsburry area this historic church was built between 1716 and 1730 as a result of Queen Anne's New Churches Act of 1711, which called for "Fifty new Churches of stone and other proper materials, with towers or steeples to each of them." Hawksmoor designed six of these churches, St. Georges Bloomsburry being his last. The land at which this church was built was originally a part of the parish of St. Giles in the fields.

This plot of land was rectangular in shape with a north - south axis and surrounded by buildings on all sides thus raising a huge problem as the commissioners stipulation 1711 clearly stated that no new church can be built on any land if the axis of the same is not east-west. Hawksmoor's final designs for this church were only accepted after the initial designs of James Gibbs and Sir John Vanburgh were rejected.

Then there's the tower. This is surely the oddest church tower in the land: a pyramid, of all things, topped by a statue of George I in Roman garb, with a pair of lions and unicorns cavorting around its base !

St. Georges Bloomsburry, Stepped Pyramid Stepple

Hawksmoor, a master of the English Baroque style, is said to be inspired by the temple of Bacchus in Baalbek, Lebanon, for this master piece and a stepped pyramidal steeple inspired by the Tomb of Mausolus at Halicarnassus, an ancient Greek City in present - day Turkey. The steeple came topped with the only statue of George I and the pyramid also supported four 10' creatures - two lions and two unicorns.

The temple of Bacchus in Baalbek, Lebanon

The Tomb of Mausolus at Halicarnassus

The church continued to evolve and change and the last major restoration occurred in 1871 under the direction of George Edmund Street. He kept the north-south orientation and updated the church to Victorian tastes. At this time, the massive unicorns and lions on the steeple were deemed frivolous and potentially unsafe and were removed.

The Bloomsbury church had to be sandwiched into an existing street. The allotted site posed considerable problems, since it was longer running north-south than east-west. Ideally, in Christian tradition, the altar would be at the eastern end of the church, but in this case, that would have made for a short, wide nave rather than a long, narrow one. A sort of limited competition, between James Gibbs, Vanbrugh and Hawksmoor, was held to see who could come up with the best solution. The commissioners chose Vanbrugh's design, which put the altar to the north. But Hawksmoor persisted, and eventually won through, with an ingenious plan that allowed for an east-west orientation.


Interior:

The rectangular limestone building (130x90 ft. with a 42-ft. ceiling) featured a symmetrical interior with the apse and altar on the eastern wall, as dictated by the church at the time. Hawksmoor was able to incorporate this east-west orientation in spite of the rectangular north-south site. Two galleries along the north and south walls faced each other and provided open, clear views of the altar and massive reredos in the apse, and clerestory windows provided ample daylight.

Since the time of construction, the Church has a long architectural account that includes many twists and turns.

Within a year of the church's opening in 1731, there were complaints about the lack of space.
The church had under gone constant changes and a west gallery was added early on and additional pews were added to increase the seating to almost 1,000. In 1781, the interior was re-oriented on a north-south axis and the north gallery was removed so the reredos and altar could be moved to this wall. The south portico became the main entrance, the pews were shifted round 90 degrees and the windows behind it were blanked out. And that is more or less how the building stayed.

The most recent is a five-year restoration that was completed in 2006. Inspired by the World Monuments Fund (WMF), the project brought the ailing structure back to life to serve the community for at least another century or two.

Conclusion:

According to my observation Nicholas Hawksmoor did a very good job in designing the church according to the requirements of the authorities, within the limitations of the allocated site. He also managed to keep it as beautiful and hospitable as possible without taking any liberties outside the given parameters. Keeping the east west orientation on a rectangular plot with a north-south axis is the proof. He used the space very intelligently and kept it well lit ultimately creating a hallucination. But doing all this he missed out on the relevance of the structure for a longer period of time. The numbers of renovations on the structure are the result of that. The structure could not stand relevant for a very long period of time without being tampered with and in the end all the parameters he worked within had to be changed. What I infer from the example of Bloomsbury is that a structure should primarily be designed keeping in mind the available plot and resources and the design should be judged on the long-term relevance of the structure so that it stays relevant for a long period of time to stand as a representative of its architectural style without being hampered.

References

• Meller, Hugh (1975) St. George's Bloomsbury: an illustrated guide to the church. London: St George's Church ISBN 0 9504224 0 1
• Roberts, Ursula (1955) Portrait of a Parson; by Susan Miles [pseud.] London: Allen & Unwin (William Corbett Roberts, 1873-1953, rector of St George's)