Downside Abbey

Book excerpt: Described by Sir Nikolaus Pevsner as ‘the most splendid demonstration of the renaissance of Roman Catholicism in England’, the Neo-Gothic church at Downside Abbey, Somerset, was built between the 1880s and the 1930s under the direction of some of the country’s most renowned ecclesiastical architects. This elegant new book reviews the history and construction of this magnificent building, designed to rival the scale of England’s great medieval Gothic cathedrals. Contributions by distinguished architectural historians explore, among other subjects,Thomas Garner’s majestic choir, Sir Giles Gilbert Scott’s soaring nave and the exquisitely redesigned Lady chapel of Sir Ninian Comper. Generously illustrated throughout with drawings, plans, archival photography and dramatic new images by Paul Barker, one of the UK’s pre-eminent architectural photographers, Downside Abbey is an absorbing account of a remarkable place of worship.