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The tower of St Mary Aldermary is one of the great Wren
moments, one of the three great eyecatcher towers in the
City along with St Bride to the west along Fleet Street
and St Dunstan in the East by the Tower of London. It was
clearly intended as a foil to the cathedral when viewed
from south of the river, with its great rabbit-eared
parapet as if it were visiting the city on a day out from
Suffolk. The gothic style of the church is popularly
believed to have been a demand of the patron, Henry
Rogers, but it seems just as likely that it was simply a
copying of the features of the medieval church which had
been rebuilt on a grand scale just 150 years before. That
project was bankrolled by Sir Henry Keeble, and in fact
the roof and tower were not completed until the 1620s,
forty years before the great fire.Internally, this church is a great sugar
confection, the plaster-fan vaulting of the nave and
aisles full of joy, like being inside a giant wedding
cake. This is like nothing medieval in London or
elsewhere, but as Pevsner points out, perhaps Wren was
copying the work of the 1620s, not that of the medieval
period. The arcades that support it look at first
medieval, but during the 1935 repairs they were found to
be standing on reused medieval rubble. Many of the
furnishings are long after Wren, although the 17th
Century font survives, as does a very attractive sword
rest. Pevsner had no kind words to say for Lawrence Lee's
glass, although to my mind its simplicity is a perfect
foil for the architectural grandeur. In any case, John
Crawford's west window is better.
This church is epic in scale, without the intimacy
familiar from its near neighbours. The great tower is
seen perfectly from the viewing platform of the Tate
Modern gallery across the river, its significance to the
City's urban landscape immediately apparent.
Simon Knott, December 2015
location: Queen Victoria Street 3/042
status: in use by a religious community
access: generally open unless an event is on
                    
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