What is it?
Winchester Cathedral
Do you think that’s an obvious choice – or do you reckon it’s a hidden gem?
An obvious choice if you live near Winchester!
Any honourable mentions?
Gloucester Services. If you’re taking a trip using the M5, make sure you stop here. Designed to sit in harmony with the landscape, Gloucester Services won a RIBA National Award in 2016 for its significant contribution to architecture. It has a “living roof” planted with grasses and wildflowers, making the building invisible when viewed from above. The interior is crafted using Cotswold dry stone and the Forest of Dean ash stems, giving it a real naturalistic character. Makes a nice change from most service stations!
Dishonourable mentions?
Any multi-storey car park in the UK.
Can you tell us a little about its history?
It’s hard to summarise as the history spans all the way back to c. 648 (when it was known as “Old Minster”), and subsequent events, such as William the Conqueror’s invasion and the Dissolution of the Monasteries, means that the building has (literally) been through the wars, and has survived subsequent rededications, dissolutions and reformations. By the 20th century, Winchester Cathedral was in grave danger of collapse as huge cracks had appeared in the walls, now bulging and leaning. It was discovered that the Normans had constructed the Cathedral on a 15 inch thick layer of beech trees, laid diagonally one on top of the other. Where some trees had rotted, the Cathedral had subsided. Below was a solid layer of peat and then a solid layer of gravel, which was to be used for the new foundations. When the peat was dug through to the gravel, water from the nearby River Itchen flooded the trenches that had been dug to build up to the raft of trees.
William Walker, arguably the country’s most experienced diver at the time, was summoned to descend into the flooded trenches and level them, by removing the peat and then laying cement to plug the water coming up from below. The trenches were cramped, pitch-black and full of bodies and graves. Walker worked six to seven hour shifts almost every day for six years, and was later rewarded with the Royal Victoria Order and to this day is credited with saving the Cathedral from collapse.
The Cathedral as it stands today is dedicated to numerous saints, most notably Swithun of Winchester. It has a very long and wide nave in the Perpendicular Gothic style, and with an overall length of 558 feet, it is the longest medieval cathedral in the world.
What about your history with the building – what was your first memory of it?
It’s not my first memory of it, but the most important memory for me is that my Grandpa’s funeral was held in Winchester Cathedral. Although not a happy memory, it meant a lot that we could have his funeral here – Winchester Cathedral has been renowned for its great choral music for hundreds of years. Grandpa had an avid passion for music and was a very talented pianist, often accompanying the school choirs he founded whilst he was the head teacher at a local primary school. He was also a member of the “Friends of Winchester Cathedral”, a charity set up in 1931 to support the Cathedral.
Is it the inside or outside that does it for you?
A very hard choice! Both are equally stunning, but I’d have to say the outside just about tops it. The grandeur of the building as you approach it never ceases to amaze me, and I love the fact that from afar you can see how long it is.
An interesting feature of the outside is that it is home to a pair of peregrine falcons (Winnie and William) who have been there since 2017, prior to which they had nested at the (now demolished) police headquarters. 2022 saw the successful fledge of two chicks (Elizabeth and George), and it looks like Winnie and William are set to breed again in 2023.
How do you think the lawyers felt about it?
I’m not sure they had construction lawyers in the year c. 648. However, as time went on, I bet it would have provided a healthy source of work for construction lawyers (to the extent that they existed in the same way we do today), all those defects and variations! The initial work to save the Cathedral from the flooding, as described above, caused a rift between the architect and the engineer due to some differing opinions as to how to address the issues, and arguably some of the actions of the architect actually made the problems worse. This resonates quite strongly with some of the issues that contentious construction lawyers commonly deal with today.
Nothing’s perfect though, is there anything you would change about it?
I can’t think of a single thing. It is imperfection that makes something unique after all.
Do you think it will last?
It’s been around since c. 648 and has evolved through so many different periods of history, I think it’s safe to say it will last.
Have you got any others to tick off?
Lots. I’d love to see the Inca ruins in Peru, and the Valley of the Kings in Egypt.
