Church Of St Pancras

The Church of St Pancras is a Greek Revival church built between 1819 and 1822 by H and HW Inwood, with restoration work undertaken between 1951 and 1953. It is constructed from Portland stone with stone-coloured terracotta detailing. The church has a rectangular plan, comprising a six-bay nave, a western vestibule surmounted by a tower, and an apsidal east end with rectangular tribunes to the north and south. Its design was influenced by St Martin-in-the-Fields, but incorporates rich detailing derived from casts of the Erechtheum in Athens.

The west front features a hexastyle Ionic portico approached by two steps, with three architraved doorways leading to panelled wooden doors. A four-stage tower rises over the vestibule, loosely based on the Tower of the Winds, featuring an octagonal ashlar drum, columns supporting an octagonal entablature, and a pointed finial with a cross. The north and south facades have recessed windows framed by Ionic half columns and palmette brattishing above the cornice. Projecting from the east end are rectangular tribunes with porticoes supported by four terracotta caryatids, modelled on those of the Erechtheum by John Rossi and built around cast-iron columns. Behind the caryatids is a sarcophagus.

Inside, the entrance leads into an octagonal vestibule corresponding with the tower above, which is ceiled over a ring of dwarf Doric columns. The nave has a flat coffered ceiling and galleries supported on lotus columns around three sides. The apse features six verd-antique scagliola Ionic columns on a marble podium. There are early memorial tablets in a Grecian style. The north tribune contains the Clerk’s vestry, with Ionic columns supporting an oval ceiling. A pulpit is carried on four Ionic columns, and a high altar, dating from 1914 and by Adams & Holden, is also present. Stained glass windows are by Clayton and Bell.

The church is noted as the earliest Greek Revival church in London, built as part of the southern expansion of St Pancras, superseding the earlier parish church on Pancras Road.