St Thomas à Becket sculpture is a Grade II listed building in the City of London local planning authority area, England. First listed on 19 January 2016. Sculpture. 1 related planning application.
St Thomas à Becket sculpture
- WRENN ID
- hushed-footing-tide
- Grade
- II
- Local Planning Authority
- City of London
- Constituency
- Cities of London and Westminster MP: Rachel Blake (Lab)
- Country
- England
- Date first listed
- 19 January 2016
- Type
- Sculpture
- Address
- St Thomas à Becket sculpture, St Paul's Cathedral Churchyard, City and County of the City of London, EC4M 8AD
- OS grid reference
- TQ 321 811
- Coordinates
- 51.51351, -0.09769
- Source
- Historic England listing
Description
The statue of St Thomas à Becket is a fibreglass resin sculpture created by E Bainbridge Copnall between 1970 and 1971, and it was installed in St Paul’s Cathedral Churchyard in 1973. The statue has a bronzed finish and measures 2.45 meters long and 1.3 meters high, making it larger than life. It is mounted on a stepped stone base that is 22 centimeters tall, which features a plaque that reads ‘BECKET / BY/ BAINBRIDGE COPNALL / ACQUIRED BY THE CORPORATION OF LONDON / 1973’.
The sculpture depicts St Thomas à Becket in a prostrate position at the moment of his martyrdom in the choir of Canterbury Cathedral. This posture has been compared to still photographs from the 1970 production of T.S. Eliot’s play 'Murder in the Cathedral', which was staged in Canterbury Cathedral. The figure's head is thrown back, and the hands are extended as if to ward off the blows of his assassins. The face is expressively rendered, featuring an elongated chin, pointed nose, and lentoid eyes with heavy eyelids. During a restoration, Patrick Crouch added a hood to the flowing drapery of the gown to enhance the stability of the sculpture.
Local climate
St Thomas à Becket sculpture sits in one of the driest parts of the UK, with an average of 690 mm of rain a year. This makes it drier than 95% of listed buildings in the UK. Its exposure to wind-driven rain is lower than that of 98% of listed buildings.
It experiences an average of 35 freeze-thaw cycles a year, more than 57% of listed buildings. Of these, 16 follow at least 1 mm of rain in the preceding 48 hours. Average temperatures at this location have risen by 0.3°C per decade since 1991.
Averages for 1991–2020; temperature trend 1991–2025. Figures describe the wider area (a grid cell of roughly 10 km), not the individual site. Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information 2026.
More on this building
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- No EPC on record for this property
- No sale records on file
- Related listed building consents — 1 application
- Detailed attributes — period, style, materials, features
- Flood risk assessment
- Radon risk assessment
- Weather exposure and heating demand — rain and frost month by month and year by year, wind direction, solar and humidity
Matched applications, energy data and sale records are assembled automatically and may contain errors. Flag incorrect data.
Similar buildings
The closest matches to this building from all 493,000 UK listed buildings, by architecture, period and materials.
- 1 Parish Church of St Thomas A Becket
- 2 Church of St Thomas A Becket
- 3 Illegible Headstone Approximately 9 Metres South of the Nave of the Church of St Thomas A Becket
- 4 Illegible Headstone Approximately 6 Metres South East of the Chancel of the Church of St Thomas A Becket
- 5 Church of St Thomas A Becket
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Nearby listed buildings
- K6 Telephone Kiosks at St Paul's Cathedral
- Tower of Former Church of St Augustine
- Cathedral Church of St Paul
- St Lawrence Jewry Drinking Fountain
- St Pauls Cathedral Choir School
- St Paul's Cross
- Footings of Destroyed Cloister and Chapter House
- Railings to Churchyard of Cathedral Church of St Paul
- The Centre Page
- Chapter House of St Paul's Cathedral