The Campaigns for Christ Church, Spitalfields and Nicholas Hawksmoor, 1960

The Campaigns for Christ Church, Spitalfields and Nicholas Hawksmoor, 1960–1995

Young, Elizabeth

The following paper gives a first-hand, account of the Hawksmoor Committee's efforts, beginning in 1960, to save Christ Church, Spitalfields from a threat of demolition, and to establish Nicholas Hawksmoor, its architect, in the pantheon of British architects. The latter purpose was secured by 1966; but although Christ Church's future became safe, sufficient funds for full restoration are only now in sight.

In 1995, English Heritage offered nearly half a million pounds; then in April 1996, the National Heritage Memorial Fund announced £2,441,500 for Christ Church, and a further £500,000 came as a gift from the Monument Trust of the Sainsbury family charitable trusts. Even these huge sums will not be enough to complete the necessary works, and fundraising will need to continue—for the crypt, the organ and the churchyard. The Friends of Christ Church, Spitalfields have launched an appeal for the rest. Work will now start later this year and the fabric should be complete for the millennium.

Important buildings, it is argued, need bodies of ‘Friends’, both to ensure their survival and to provide the alternative and additional uses that the ‘system’, however well it operates, cannot.