Church Of St George And Attached Railings, Gates And Lamps

The Church of St George, located on Bloombsury Way in Camden, was built between 1716 and 1731, designed by the renowned architect Nicholas Hawksmoor. It was re-ordered in 1781, restored in 1870 by G.E. Street, and subsequently renovated between 1972 and 1974 by Lawrence King. The church is constructed of stone-faced brick.

The principal south facade features a hexastyle Roman Corinthian portico, elevated on a podium accessed by a broad flight of steps. The ground floor has arched openings, with segmental-headed windows above. A tower, originally intended to provide a conventional west entrance, stands to the west, incorporating recessed arches on three sides, a clock face, tetrastyle porticos on each facade of the belfry, and a stepped steeple topped with a sculpted statue of George I in Roman attire.

The north facade, facing Little Russell Street, is pedimented and features two storeys of partly blind arcading on a podium with steps to entrances on either side. The podium has five square-headed openings with massive keystones, while the first floor has Corinthian pilasters supporting an entablature, and the second floor has Corinthian half-columns. A lunette is set within the pediment.

The interior, now oriented north-south, features paired Corinthian columns supporting an entablature and an elliptical arch at the south end, behind which is a panelled timber gallery and organ, with a vestibule beneath. The east wall contains a small apse originally designed for the altar, adorned with a moulded and gilded ceiling depicting a pelican and scallop shell, flanked by mitres and croziers with winged cherubs in clouds, a design by Isaac Mansfield. A round-headed entrance to a vestibule is located on the west wall, leading to a staircase ascending to a small round-headed gallery with a wrought-iron balcony, originally intended for the servants of the gentry. The current north chancel is emphasised by double elliptical arches on entablatures with paired Corinthian columns, which originally would have had galleries between the columns to further emphasise the east-west orientation. The original reredos is an aedicule with Corinthian columns and a broken pediment. A five-sided, panelled, and carved mahogany pulpit is also original to the church.

Attached to the frontage are cast-iron railings and gates. C19 lamps with Windsor lanterns flank the steps, their design mirroring the stepped steeple, incorporating cast-iron models of lions and unicorns at the base.

St George's Church was sanctioned by the Fifty New Churches Act of 1711 to alleviate the burden on parishioners of the northern part of St Giles-in-the-Fields parish, who previously had to traverse the notorious Rookery district. The design of the stepped steeple was inspired by Pliny’s description of the Tomb of Mausolus at Halicarnassus.