Sacred London

Places of religious significance. Worth a visit for the architecture, the art or the history.

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Russian Orthodox Cathedral of the Dormition

Vulliamy's Italian Romanesque basilica of 1849, with Arts and Crafts murals by Heywood Sumner and a Russian congregation.

Christianity

Lewis Vulliamy built it in 1848-9 as an Anglican church, in brick with a stone west front, in an Italian Romanesque that was unusual for its date in London: a basilica with lean-to aisles, an apse, galleries on three sides and a campanile at the south-west corner. The west front has a gabled porch on marble columns with a rose window above it. Townsend restored and added to it between 1887 and 1897.

Inside, very tall Corinthian columns carry the arcade under a small clerestory, and the decoration - murals among it - is by Heywood Sumner, one of the better Arts and Crafts hands and a man better known for sgraffito than for paint.

It has been the cathedral of the Russian Orthodox Diocese of Sourozh since the 1950s, which means an Italian Romanesque basilica built by an English architect for Anglicans now holds an iconostasis and a Slavonic liturgy.

Where
67 Ennismore Gardens, SW7 1NH
Nearest station
Knightsbridge · 7 min walk

Open through the Divine Services; the diocese's site carries the times.

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Data is compiled from public sources including OpenStreetMap, under the ODbL. Hours change often, so check before making a journey.

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