Tower of St Anne's Church, Soho is a Grade II* listed building in the Westminster local planning authority area, England. First listed on 24 February 1958. Church tower.
Tower of St Anne's Church, Soho
- WRENN ID
- scarred-plaster-elder
- Grade
- II*
- Local Planning Authority
- Westminster
- Constituency
- Cities of London and Westminster MP: Rachel Blake (Lab)
- Country
- England
- Date first listed
- 24 February 1958
- Type
- Church tower
- Address
- Tower of St Anne's Church, Soho, Wardour Street W1, City of Westminster
- OS grid reference
- TQ 297 809
- Coordinates
- 51.51236, -0.13229
- Source
- Historic England listing
Description
The Tower of St Anne's Church in Soho is a church tower built between 1801 and 1803 by architect S. P. Cockerell. The main body of the church was designed by either Sir Christopher Wren or Sir John Talman but was destroyed during the Blitz and has since been completely demolished. The tower is constructed of stock brick and Portland stone, topped with a lead spire that also serves as a clock tower.
This tower is an exceptional example of neo-classical rationalism, showcasing sophisticated planar modelling. It consists of three stages: the lower two stages are made of brick set on a stone plinth, featuring a semicircular arched recess and flanking battered buttress-piers that are slightly inset from the corners. There is a block cornice with a stone tablet positioned below the recess, which appears to "hang" over it. The second stage has a stone plinth with a shallow segmented recess above the block cornice, a louvred oculus, and quoin pilasters that have corresponding breaks in the cornice and blocking course above.
The tall stone belfry exhibits a marked batter, chamfered corners, and Doric columns that are "squeezed" in antis beside the louvred openings, topped with a deeply moulded crowning cornice. Above this rises the remarkable steeple and clock tower, which begins as a truncated stone cone, transitions into a lead drum with oculi, and then waists before expanding into intersecting "barrels" that hold the four clock faces, culminating in a finial and weathervane.
Local climate
Tower of St Anne's Church, Soho 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.
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