Church Of St Giles In The Fields

The Church of St Giles-in-the-Fields is a church built between 1731 and 1733. It was designed by Henry Flitcroft and restored in 1896 and around 1952, when N Haines and G Jackson also restored interior decoration. The building is constructed from Portland stone with a copper roof and is in a Classical style. It has a rectangular plan, featuring a five-bay nave and a vestibule at the west end with a tower above.

The exterior features rusticated stone up to the level of the interior gallery, above which is plain ashlar with rusticated quoins. The ground floor windows have flat arches, while the gallery windows are round-headed with keystones, moulded architraves and plain impost blocks. A modillion cornice sits above, surmounted by a blocking course. Entrance doors, framed with Gibbs surrounds, are located at the south and north facades. The west end is pedimented with a flight of seven steps leading to a two-leaf, fielded three-panelled entrance door, also with a Gibbs surround. Above this door is a semicircular headed window flanked by round-headed niches and square niches above those. Carved into the entablature is the inscription "H FLITCROFT ARCHITECTUS". The east end is also pedimented and features a Doric Venetian window with glazing to the centre only. The tower has a rusticated base, an ashlar belfry with round-headed openings, coupled pilasters supporting an entablature, and clocks and urn finials on each face. An octagonal lantern features engaged Ionic columns that support an entablature broken forward at each angle. The spire has rustic bands, a golden ball weathervane.

The interior features a three-lobby vestibule at the west end, the central lobby leading to the nave, with open stairs to galleries on either side. The nave has a tunnel vault, and a shallow sanctuary with groin-vaulted aisles, galleries extending across the west end. Square, panelled piers rise to support Ionic columns with blocking entablatures, all made of Portland stone, and which support the roof and ceiling. A restored font dates to 1810. A Father Smith organ from 1671 is housed in a case likely dating to 1734. An inlaid mahogany pulpit dates to 1676, and a carved monument to George Chapman (translator of Homer), dated 1634, is likely to have been designed by Inigo Jones. In front of the west door stands a pedimented entrance gate made around 1810 by William Leverton, which includes a wooden relief of the Resurrection of the Dead, created between 1686 and 1687 by Love.