Westminster Cathedral

Facts and information

Address:: Westminster Cathedral, 42 Francis Street, Victoria,
London SW1P 1QW
England
Website:: www.westminstercathedral.org.uk
Opening times:: Church: 7 AM to 7 PM (daily); Campanile: 9.30 AM to 5 PM (Mon–Fri), 9.30 AM to 6 PM (Sat, Sun); Note: Opening times are subject to change, and may not apply on public holidays. Always reconfirm with the venue before making plans.
Telephone:: Work +44 (0) 207 798 9055
Buses:: 8 10 16 24 38 44 52 73 82 148 170 171 187 214 507 C1 C10
Trains:: St. James’s Park CRC DSC, Victoria CRC DSC VIC Note: The nearest train station to Westminster Cathedral is Victoria. We can help you find the best route from any other train station:
Train journey to Westminster Cathedral

^{Westminster Cathedral} The altar inside London’s Westminster Cathedral

^{Inside Westminster Cathedral}

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Westminster Cathedral is the most important Roman Catholic church in England, and is the seat of the Catholic Archbiship of Westminster. When it was designed by John Francis Bentley in the 1890s he eschewed the Gothic style popular with Victorians, and went for a striking Byzantine exterior. The fact that London’s Protestant Gothic masterpiece, Westminster Abbey, was just a stone’s throw from the pulpit may have had a lot to do with this bold statement.

On first viewing the cathedral doesn’t even look like an English church – its red-and-white stripped exterior looks more like a Turkish temple. The cupola was modelled on the one at St. Sophia. And its 83-metre tall bell-tower (or campanile), has a passing resemblance to the Basilica of St. Mark.

Inside Westminster Cathedral

The interior is certainly worth a visit… it’s quite unlike anything that you will expect. The famous fourteen Stations of the Cross depicting Christ’s crucifixion were carved by Eric Gill in 1918, and the nave is the widest in the country – with seats enough for twelve hundred. It is 342 feet long, 156 feet wide and almost as tall again – 117 feet.

The decoration hit a snag when funds for the marble ran out halfway through. Bentley was forced to continue the upper-half in bare brick.

The cathedral’s campanile

A popular pastime for tourists is a climb up the cathedral’s campanile, with fine views of Buckingham Palace and Parliament. There is even a lift installed, so you won’t have to struggle up the stairs.

Most Londoners are unaware of the secret that awaits them at the summit… the cross at the top is said to contain a relic of the ‘True Cross’ – a piece removed from Christ’s own crucifix.

>> Drummerboy’s blog – Westminster Cathedral

Drummerboy – “The outside looks a bit bizarre with all the stripes and domes and turrets and you’d never guess that it’s a catholic church, but inside it’s pretty decent. The place is huge, it’s just one big nave that goes on up and up and gets blacker and blacker the higher you go. The bottom half is all nice with marble and paintings, statues and plaques etc, but the top half is just pitch black brick. That’s all it is… just smokey black brick all the way to the roof, so the interior looks like it’s domed over by the night sky… continued.”