Nicholas Hawksmoor is one of a number of distinguished architects who worked in the seventeenth century. Others included Sir Christopher Wren, Inigo Jones, and Sir John Vanbrugh. But while we remember Wren for St Paul’s Cathedral, Inigo Jones for the Banqueting House in Whitehall, and Vanbrugh for Blenheim Palace, Hawksmoor has no major work associated with him, and remains relatively unknown in comparison with his contemporaries. This lavishly illustrated guide to his London churches, including the steeples he designed for Wren’s City Churches, also looks at Hawksmoor’s life and wider work and includes a guided tour around his churches from former Archdeacon of London David Meara.

'A helpful coloured map pinpoints their location. His enthusiastic prose is admirably complemented by the stunning colour photographs specially taken by Stuart Vallis which highlights their beauty and individuality.' * Oxfordshire Historic Churches Trust, September 2024 *

David Meara is a retired Church of England clergyman who worked in the Oxford Diocese for twenty-seven years, and then served as Rector of St. Bride’s Fleet Street and Archdeacon of London until 2014. He has made a lifetime study of Church movements and brasses and has published extensively on the subject. He has published on a range of topics, including Anglo-Scottish sleeper trains and the scuttling of German ships at Scapa Flow. His father-in-law fought in Burma in the Second World War.