St Pancras Parish Church

Euston Road, Camden

Grade I. 1819-22 by Henry & William Inwood, with caryatids by J F C Rossi.

This magnificent church, opposite St Pancras Station, is one of the finest Greek Revival buildings in the country and the earliest church in London executed in this style. Many of the architectural details of the church were faithfully copied straight from the Erechtheum in Athens. St Pancras is very active in the local community and provides a chaplaincy for University College London. The church spent £120,000 on repairs to the roof two years ago, and is now looking at moving forward with a £3.6 million restoration scheme. The restoration will include the Portland stone façade, which is cracked and unstable, with masonry breaking off in chunks, in part due to the affects of pollution. The church is in talks with the Heritage Lottery Fund about a bid. St Pancras Church would like to start a pilot project to restore one of the fabulous terracotta caryatids that decorate the crypt porches. These have internal cast-iron structural supports which have caused the terracotta to bulge and crack and parts of the decoration to fall off. They plan to start restoring one caryatid on the Euston Road – this will act as publicity for further fundraising and will allow the restorers to work out the best restoration plan for these precious statues. The Trust has offered a grant of £5000 towards this high profile project.