Bookable
An Apollonaut travel guide
A church beside Parliament.
An introduction to Westminster, where the Abbey stands beside Parliament Square and the Palace of Westminster.
On this page
Read the square
Westminster Abbey faces Parliament Square, with St Margaret’s Church on its north side and the Palace of Westminster across the road. Together they form a UNESCO World Heritage Site, listed in 1987.
A guide can give context without turning a place into a backdrop. Notice how the Abbey’s North Entrance faces the square, how the Gothic of the Abbey answers the Victorian Gothic of Parliament, and how Dean’s Yard and the cloisters open quietly to the south.
Gothic, old and new
The Abbey’s nave and chapels are medieval Gothic, while its western towers were added in the 1740s by Nicholas Hawksmoor and John James in a Gothic style of their own time.
Begin with a detail and ask when it was built, who paid for it and who looked after it. A photograph alone cannot tell you that.
A Westminster chapter
Westminster Abbey shows one side of Westminster: a working church at the heart of the nation’s ceremonies.
Look at the meeting of the two: daily worship in an ancient building, and the great state occasions that it has hosted for centuries.
Make room for context
Pair this reading with the Abbey’s history and the Journal. This is an introduction for visitors, not a claim that our team manages these places or represents the people who run them.
Read at the source
Sources & further reading
Links lead to the original publishers.
