A Gothic Revival Architect at the Height of His Powers

George Edmund Street (1824–1881), born in Woodford, Essex, was one of the leading architects and scholars of the Victorian Gothic Revival. Street looked to medieval architecture for inspiration, particularly the Gothic of the 13th and 14th centuries: pointed arches, steeply pitched roofs, clustered columns, rich stone carving, stained glass and an emphasis on vertical height and light. He combined these historic forms with modern Victorian materials and methods, creating buildings that were both scholarly in their detail and bold in their effect. He designed St Mary Magdalene’s at the height of his powers, while his most famous work, the Royal Courts of Justice on the Strand, was under construction.

Designing for the Site

The site was a narrow, difficult strip hemmed in by terraces, and Street responded by building upwards: an exceptionally tall church, drawing light from its clerestory high above the street. When the parish was founded in 1865, Street and the curate Richard Temple West were determined that its church should be a building of genuine beauty and ambition, rather than a cheaper or plainer version dictated by the neighbourhood. Street brought together some of the finest craftsmen of his day, including Thomas Earp, Henry Holiday and the Venetian Salviati workshop, whose stonework, stained glass and mosaics made the church a showcase of High Victorian Gothic design. His achievement was widely recognised and he became an Associate of the Royal Academy in 1866, received the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) Royal Gold Medal in 1874 and was appointed Professor of Architecture at the Royal Academy in 1880. He died in 1881, three years after the church was consecrated, and is commemorated by a statue in the Great Hall of the Royal Courts of Justice.

Today

You can still read what Street saw. Brick and Marble in the Middle Ages, published in 1855, is his own travelogue of the architecture he went looking for in Italy – pointed arches, sculptural detail, metalwork and furniture, copiously illustrated, recorded building by building. It is the closest thing there is to seeing what he was thinking about before he designed this.