New West End Synagogue

The New West End Synagogue is a synagogue built between 1877 and 1879 to designs by George Ashdown Audsley, with additional interior decoration completed in 1894–95 and minor alterations during the 20th century. The foundation stone was laid by Leopold de Rothschild in 1877, and the building was consecrated and opened in 1879 on a site in Bayswater purchased with a grant from the Rothschilds and a loan from the United Synagogue. Although Audsley was based in Liverpool, he was the sole designer of the building and remained consultant architect throughout the 1880s until he emigrated to the United States around 1890. The clerk of works who supervised construction was Nathaniel Joseph.

Exterior

The building is constructed of red brick, Mansfield stone and terracotta with a slate roof, following a rectangular basilica plan with its principal elevation facing St Petersburgh Place. The façade has a tripartite composition with corner turrets flanking an advancing central section. This central section is dominated by a large rose window set within a cusped horseshoe arch above a portal with a pointed arch profile. The flanking sections feature round-arched windows at ground-floor level and blind arcading at first floor beneath a heavy cornice. The side return has six bays, and the rear elevation is largely blind except for irregularly placed mullion windows, a door, and a large rose window at the east end.

Interior

The prayer hall is approached through a double-height foyer containing memorial tablets and a war memorial. Two stone staircases with wrought iron balusters provide access to the Ladies Gallery. The decorative scheme in the foyer has been covered by later white paintwork, though the original paintwork survives beneath.

The prayer hall features a pointed arched arcade of five bays on cast-iron columns clad in marble with foliated capitals, supporting a ribbed ceiling vault. The arch spandrels are decorated with marble panels, each to a slightly different design, possibly by Audsley and inserted in 1894–95. The walls are entirely lined with marble and alabaster and display applied Hebrew texts in gilt lettering. A tall horseshoe arch over the Ark at the east end has a soffit decorated with stencilled geometric patterns. A second arch at the west end frames a secondary gallery over the entrance hall, designed by Audsley and built in 1881 as an extension to the original Ladies Gallery, which runs around three sides of the hall.

The doors and gallery fronts are in teak, with Hebrew script fashioned in brass forming a pattern running around the base of the gallery fronts—an insertion of 1884. The prayer hall has a mosaic floor designed by Audsley. The foundation stone is preserved in an office at the eastern end of the building.

Fixtures and Fittings

The Bimah, of carved, gilded wood, alabaster and marble, is placed at the western end of the hall as is customary in Orthodox synagogues. It features forty-nine capitals, no two of which share the same design. The Ark is constructed of banded alabaster and cippolino marble and has a central Byzantine domed cupola and six lanterns topped with Assyrian minarets of gilded wood and plaster. Both the Bimah and Ark were designed by Audsley, crafted by Norbury, Upton and Paterson of Liverpool, and installed as part of the original scheme.

The two Bimah lamps, the Ner Tamid (perpetually-lit lamp near the Ark), and the pair of giant Menorahs are also to Audsley's designs and were made by Hart, Son and Peard and installed in 1879. The remaining brass light fittings, representing one of the most complete late-Victorian electrical lighting schemes that survive, were installed in 1895 and were designed by George Aitcheson.

The pulpit, dating from 1907 on a plinth from the 1890s, is made of marble and alabaster. The choir gallery and screen were inserted in 1888. The seating on the ground floor and in the balconies is in contrasting woods, rising in tiers from the open centre. The mahogany Mizrach Seat, for the minister, was installed in 1884.

Stained Glass

The western rose window—featuring a Star of David, water lily and daisy motif—and the clerestory windows, designed by Audsley, were part of the original scheme and crafted by R B Edmondson and Son of Manchester. The stained glass in patterns of foliage, fruits and flowers is by Nathanial Westlake and Co and dates from 1905 onwards. A later rose window at the east end by the Hungarian Jewish artist Erwin Bossanyi was inserted in 1935 and reinstalled after the Second World War in 1946.

Historical Context

In 1894–95, the decoration of the interior was completed to Audsley's original designs when Sir Isadore Spielmann—a renowned patron of the arts—supervised the lining of the walls in alabaster panels, the encasing of the arcade columns in marble, the placement of additional Hebrew texts on the walls of the prayer hall, and the addition of other fixtures and fittings. The synagogue has been little altered since the second half of the 19th century. The major intrusion of the 20th century was the whitewashing of elements of the decorative painting scheme in the lobby and on the ceiling of the prayer hall, though the original paintwork survives beneath the white paint.

The New West End Synagogue is closely comparable to the Princes Road Synagogue in Liverpool. Designed by the same architect, the synagogues were also linked by their patron—Samuel Montague, a prominent Jewish banker, philanthropist, politician and later a peer who was instrumental in the foundation of the New West End after moving to London from Liverpool in the late 1870s. As well as the two synagogues, Audsley also built up a reputation for his non-conformist church architecture and prolific writings on decorative art.

Unlike the synagogues of the 18th century and first half of the 19th century, which followed Christian non-conformist styles of building, the New West End Synagogue celebrated the cultural heritage of the people it served through the deployment of an eclectic mix of architectural styles. Contemporary archaeological scholarship traced the roots of Moorish and Assyrian architecture to the ancient temples of the Holy Land, a potent symbolic connection for Orthodox Jews in Victorian London. The distinctiveness of the architecture coupled with the finest synagogue interior in London made the New West End Synagogue the principal affirmation of the prominence, wealth and cultural identity of the Anglo-Jews of the West End in the last quarter of the 19th century.

Significance

The exceptional architectural interest of the New West End Synagogue lies in the scale, distinctiveness and opulence of the building and the completeness of vision it represents as a largely unaltered late-Victorian building. The architecture and designed elements of the Synagogue illustrate many characteristics of that era's taste for the decorative arts including exoticism, as seen in the eclectic style of the exterior which combines neo-Grecian, Romanesque, Assyrian and Moorish elements; intricacy of detailing, in the variety of capitals of the Bimah (no two are the same) and in the arcade spandrels which each have a unique design; and polychromy in materials, as evidenced in the mosaic floor, alabaster and marble wall casing, and the stained glass. Additional features, most notably the complete electric lighting scheme—believed to be one of the most intact in the country—and the Westlake stained glass windows, add further interest.

The significance of the building is enhanced by its historic context as a Jewish place of worship. The New West End Synagogue is exceptional as a prominent and influential example of the confident style of religious architecture which emerged in non-Christian places of worship as toleration was extended to non-Anglicans in the period after 1830. The Synagogue stands near to the contemporary Greek Church of St Sophia and the Anglican Church of St Matthew (with which it has group value) and rivals these buildings as a landmark.