St John's, Smith Square is a church in the middle of Smith Square, Westminster, London. Sold to a charitable Trust as a ruin following firebombing in the Second World War, it was restored, the internal layout altered somewhat, and is now used as a concert hall.
This grade I listed church was designed by Thomas Archer and was completed in 1728. It is regarded as one of the finest works of English Baroque architecture, and features four corner towers and monumental broken pediments. It is often referred to as 'Queen Anne's Footstool' because as legend has it, when Archer was designing the church he asked the Queen what she wanted it to look like. She kicked over her footstool and said 'Like that!', giving rise to the building's four corner towers. The towers were, in fact, added to stabilise the building against subsidence.
Read more about St John's, Smith Square: History, Access, The Crypt
Famous quotes containing the words smith and/or square:
“If we shake hands with icy fingers, it is because we’ve burnt them so hatefully before.”
—Logan Pearsall Smith (1865–1946)
“O for a man who is a man, and, as my neighbor says, has a bone in his back which you cannot pass your hand through! Our statistics are at fault: the population has been returned too large. How many men are there to a square thousand miles in this country? Hardly one.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)