The Chapel Today
Today Hosking's novel chapel continues to merit acclaim as an outstandingly attractive architectural set piece of special importance amongst the Magnificent Seven London garden cemeteries of the time, and indeed throughout Europe. It also has significance in relation to the general evolution of ideas and schemes for nondenominational burial grounds and cemeteries, establishing itself as the first to incorporate a nondenominational chapel and other characteristics that lead to it being considered today as the first wholly nondenominational garden cemetery in Europe. However, a fire gutted the interior and it has been closed for thirty years. The chapel remains a 'building at risk' despite re-roofing and other structural repairs. Plans are being progressed by The Abney Park Cemetery Trust to re-open it and give access to the public and community groups once again along with an improved nature and landscape setting.
Read more about this topic: Abney Park Chapel
Famous quotes containing the words chapel and/or today:
“I went to the Garden of Love,
And saw what I never had seen:
A Chapel was built in the midst,
Where I used to play on the green.
And the gates of this Chapel were shut,
And ‘Thou shalt not’ writ over the door;”
—William Blake (1757–1827)
“Farewell? a long farewell to all my greatness.
This is the state of man; today he puts forth
The tender leaves of hopes, tomorrow blossoms,
And bears his blushing honors thick upon him:
The third day comes a frost, a killing frost,
And when he thinks, good easy man, full surely
His greatness is a-ripening, nips his root,
And then he falls as I do.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)