12 Kerry Downes, The architecture of Wren

Figure 8: Sir Christopher Wren’s St Stephen Walbrook (left) and Figure 9: Francesco Borromini’s Sant'Ivo alla Sapienza (right) both make elaborate use of a central dome within a centralised plan.

The City Steeples

With Wren’s noticeably clear awareness of Italianate models, it is through the discernment of his steeples and towers that his conception of the classical language is most consummately expressed. Despite this, St Stephen is subtle in its use of classical forms on its tower. It features a bulky mass, which protrudes up past the dome and is capped by an intricate yet modest spire, presumably added by Nicholas Hawksmoor around 40 years after the church had been built.34 A much more telling instance of Wren’s classical steeples can be found at St Mary-leBow – built in quick succession to the church itself35 but just as exciting as other steeples added to their respective church’s years later.

The steeple for St Mary-le-Bow sits atop the tower on the north-west corner of the church – planted on a square base enclosed with a balustrade – in order to add a sense of softness in the transition of the square tower to a circular steeple. The balustrades are enclosed by four pinnacles, each composed of four converging scrolls: much in the spirit of the old medieval tower. Here, Wren once again demonstrates a great degree of invention. He had no precedent of a multi-storeyed classical steeple in England to work from. Moreover, one can look much further back to understand that Vitruvius himself, in his book De Architectura, did not explain the language of antiquity in relation to large, layered vertical forms, for such structures did not exist in the ancient world36 – though this problem would be tackled eventually by Alberti in his 15th century texts. Again, Wren would look to Rome for the answer. Figure 11 shows the model for Antonio De Sangallo’s St Peter’s, Rome – a clear exemplar which Wren would have likely been directly aware of. If he was not, the model almost certainly found its way to Inigo Jones, as the concept of layered classical steeples in church facades can be seen in John Webb’s ideal church drawings.37 The first order of the steeple at St Mary-le-Bow is comprised of a circular tempietto decorated by twelve Corinthian columns – with an intercolumniation of around three diameters, thus giving the steeple an air of lightness and serenity. Above this, a transition once again occurs from the circular tempietto to the even smaller square one. In this instance, Wren recalls the scroll motif used in the bows of the old Gothic tower as well as on the cornered pinnacles of the base, revealing an ingenious vertical sequence as the up-tailing scrolls create a ‘continuity of line’ via the orders.38 The upper tempietto, also composed of twelve columns, supports a pyramid structure which carries a copper dragon-type weathervane. Wren had in fact originally intended for an octagonal shaped ‘pepper-pot’ dome, resembling the Flemish styled towers of Inigo Jones’ Whitehall designs39 , however this more lucid employment of the classical orders represents a much greater awareness of Renaissance canonical theories.

34 Stephen Wheatley, The real Wren churches, pg. 34 35 Margaret Whinney, Wren, Pg. 67 36 Kerry Downes, The architecture of Wren, pg. 82 37 Margaret Whinney, Wren, Pg. 67 38 Kerry Downes, The architecture of Wren, pg. 82 39 John Summerson, Architecture in Britain: 1530 -1830, pg. 198