LONDON CALLING: Houses of Parliament

Aside from the renowned statues (see previous post), there are several noteworthy structures around Parliament Square.

White and stylish, with a fashionably bearded mascaron (sculpted face): the South-East corner of Government Offices Great George Street (GOGGS) along Parliament Square, at the corner of Great George’s Street and Parliament Street. That side dates from 1917 (the other side was completed in 1908). It is described as being Edwardian Baroque Revival style. It houses many government offices including the Treasury, Revenue & Customs, UK Export Finance, the Internal Audit Agency, the Department of Culture, Media & Sport, the offices of the leaders of the House of Commons and of the House of Lords, part of the Northern Ireland Office, the Churchill War Rooms (a section of the Imperial War Museum)…

I feel St Margaret’s Church suffers from bad signage…

As the tourists follow the path from the sign, they seem to direct their eyes and cameras

towards the North Entrance of Westminster Abbey

which is right beside the smaller white church

and some photos of the abbey’s north portal have been wrongly posted online

under the name St Margaret’s Church…

This is St Margaret’s Church (1523)

Rebuilt on the site of a Benedictine Abbey

Anglican Parish Church of the House of Commons

The tower is 18^th c. as well as the stone on the façade; more features were altered later, including the porch and the interior

It is known for its stained glass commemorative windows

There is a golden reredos (ornamental screen) at the altar - dating from 1905, it is closed during Lent - and monuments to women who served Elizabeth I

Sir Walter Raleigh is buried here – oh Raleigh? (window and memorial inside the church – he had been beheaded for treason a few yards away on Old Palace Yard)

Outside, on the east wall (back of the church) is a bust of Charles I, ironically facing the statue of his nemesis, Oliver Cromwell, outside Westminster Hall (see post http://gherkinscall.blogspot.co.uk/2016/10/the-palace-of-westminster.html )

Winston and Clementine got married here in 1908

The church suffered damage during WWII

18^th century scene, before the Palace of Westminster was built

(Westminster Hall is the blue roof, behind the row of red houses)

I couldn’t identify the flag, but the plane is an Airbus A380

On the north side of Westminster Abbey is this commemorative panel at Broad Sanctuary. It represents a scene from the royal wedding of Prince William of Wales and Catherine Middleton in 2011. It is useful in naming the surrounding buildings, such as the modern Queen Elizabeth II Conference Centre across the road, and beside it, the much more interesting Supreme Court.

Just outside the Supreme Court (in the former Middlesex Guildhall), are two long semi-circular stone benches inscribed with a poem by Andrew Motion, Poet Laureate when the Supreme Court was established in 2005 (the next post will be my photos of the Supreme Court)

In the back ground, left to right,

Westminster Hall, St Margaret’s Church, Westminster Abbey (North Entrance)

The Supreme Court poem:

Tides tumbled sand through seas long-lost to earth;
Sand hardened into-stone – stone cut, then brought
To frame the letter of our four nations’ law
And square the circle of a single court.

Here Justice sits and lifts her steady scales
Within the Abbey’s sight and Parliaments
But independent of them both. And bound
By truth of principle and argument.

A thousand years of judgment stretch behind –
The weight of rights and freedoms balancing
With fairness and with duty to the world:
The clarity time-honoured thinking brings.

New structures but an old foundation stone:
The mind of Justice still at liberty
Four nations separate but linked as one:
The light of reason falling equally.

Andrew Motion

Next post: sculptures on the exterior building of the Supreme Court / Middlesex Guildhall
http://gherkinscall.blogspot.co.uk/2016/10/the-supreme-court.html

The view emerging from the London Underground
Westminster Station, under Portcullis House.

Bridge Street:
Portcullis House (2001 - Parliamentary Estate and Tube station) on the left;
on the right: The Palace of Westminster (the Houses of Parliament)
with Elizabeth Tower (known as Big Ben, one of the five bells it houses).

Parliament Square:
The Shard (2 miles away and the tallest building in the UK) can be seen here
between Portcullis House and Big Ben.

Far right in the pic: the octagonal Central Tower (91 metres) is in fact a ventilation shaft.
In front of it: the largest clear-span medieval roof in England, Westminster Hall (1097) - the oldest part of the Palace, it survived two fires (in the 16th & 19th centuries) and World War II bombing (roof is 21 metres x 73 metres approx. made of oak,
at least 600 oak trees were used, some 900 years ago).
The 'new' palace is mostly 19th century, gothic in style and took 30 years to build. The architect was Charles Barry; his Commons Chamber could not be saved from the fire that followed one of the several bombings of the Palace during WWII.

New Palace Yard dates from the original medieval Palace of Westminster (1097), it is now a garden
above an underground car park, but is not opened to the public.

New Palace Yard and Westminster Hall
(on the right: less ornate than the rest of the palace, with battlements on its turrets.)

Along Westminster Hall is Cromwell Green (lower than Abingdon Street)
and its statue of Oliver Cromwell.

The Union Jack flies over Victoria Tower (98.5 metres) which is the site of the Sovereign's Entrance and the Parliamentary Archives. Past the railing, on Old Palace Yard, stands the 19th century statue of Richard I Coeur de Lion - King Richard The Lionheart, riding his horse and holding a sword (which got bent by a bomb during the WWII Blitz, the statue has since been repaired).
Guy Fawkes and his confederates were hanged in that yard and Sir Walter Raleigh was beheaded there too (the latter was buried at St Margaret's Church, a few yards away, on Parliament Square).

Oliver Cromwell - Lord Protector
of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland and Ireland (1653-1658).
Half a century after the erection of Cromwell’s statue, a bust of Charles I was donated and placed outside the east wall of St Margaret’s Church (in the 1950s), thus facing Cromwell who had signed the death warrant that lead to the King being beheaded in 1649.

An Airbus A380 flying over with its 4 engines.

New Palace Yard

Obligatory discussion about the trees ensued...

There are 6 Indian Bean Trees on this site and they are believed to be at least 150 years old.
Originally from North America, Catalpas are recognisable by their long bean-like pods and their contorted trunks.

The 1859 Clock Tower was renamed Elizabeth Tower in 2012
to celebrate Queen Elizabeth II's Diamond Jubilee.
It is 96 metres high, it leans and oscillates slightly.
The top part is covered in cast iron plates.

The clock is the second largest four-faced chiming clock in the world and
it is due to be silent and covered for a three-year-long repair work.
The dials are 7 metres in diameter and behind opal glass.
The hour hands weigh 300 kg each.
The bell called Big Ben is over 2 metres in height, its hammer weighs 200 kg.