WREN'S CHURCHES

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 87, 12 April 1923, Page 3

WREN'S CHURCHES

CAN THEY BE SAVED?

DESTRUCTION THAT WILL BEGBADE LONDON.

It would be a jest for the cynic of th» future to say that we celebrated the bicentenary of the death of Wren in February by beginning to pull down some of his city churches, writes a London correspondent of the "Manchester Guardian. "■ In a lecture Mr. Mervyn Macartney, the architect in charge of St. Paul's, pointed the bitterness of the prospect by-his praise of the doomed churches and the fine photographs he showed of'their interiors and steepleß. When 'Vlr. Macartney remarked with resignation, " Some, of these are bound to disappear," there were cries from p the audience of -'-' No "■ and " Why^" A little-known church which is down on the Bishop of London's list for destruction is St. Anne and St. Agne'«, near the Post Office, of which Mr. Maoartney said that it illustrated Wren's wonderful success in • utilising fully a, small space. 'Another is St.' Vedast's, in Foster lane, which has "one of the most beautiful steeples ever designed."There were cheers from, the audience' when Mr. Macartney ..expressed the hope that Temple Bar would be brought back to London and put up, as he suggested, somewhere on the Thames Embankment. There were some curious points about Wren and his work in the. city in Mr. ; Macartney's talk. One was. the gtoryi that St. Dunstan's-in-the-Ea3t was designed by Wren's daughter. How many, people know that the pew with a canopy, and his initials which Wren occujjffcd as churchwarden in his own church of, St. Margaret Pattens is still to be seen? Wren, who was a great' astronomer,. had the idea of using the Monument "as a huge telescope. An interesting point about St. Paul's was that, the two tow#r» in the western facade were an efterthought of the architect, and, although they are 250 feet high, their stone" work, Mr. Macartney said, is dangerously thin.. Some of the stone is only 4i. inches thick, and great-trouble had to be taken, to strengthen it in recent timesr- It-was' not generally known that Wren had done, any work at St. James's Palace, but Mr. Macartney had found a large wiraber of plans at Oxford for his additions, 1 and he showed a photograph of them. Canon Alexander,who is responsible with Mr. Macartney for the fabric ol St. Paul's, said they hoped that th< great problems involved' in making the Cathedral safe had been surmounted. He thought that Wren, if he had been alive now, would not have permitted the carrying out of the scheme of building St. Paul's Bridge. ' I "We don,'t want to sse the city curches tak.|i away," said Sir Aston Webb, speaking after th» lecture. "I£ they were, London would be Jsgraded. It would be a disgraceful thing for it to be said that' just after the celebration of the bi-centenary we began to pull down the churches he built. "They are a great adornment of LonSori. :.To,'pull them down would have a far-reaching "influence. People in Manchester and Birmingham and other places - --where there may be ancient buildings occupying valuable sites might be encouraged to follow 'the example of London." Referring to a suggestion that All Hallows', Lombard street, should be pulled down and re-erected at Croydon, Sir Aston Webb said that he might as well suggest that .the Whitgift Hospital at Croydon should be moved -to London. If we" once began "shifting"^buildings about in that way, we should not Know where we were. As to the restoration ot St. Paul's, he said that if constant care was not taken, there was a serious danger in a generation or two o£ a London without St. Paul's. It was/;inconceivable that Londoners should ever alkm: such a calamity to take place.