St Paul's Cathedral

St Paul's Cathedral in the City of London, on Ludgate Hill, is Sir Christopher Wren's masterpiece and the defining building of the post-Fire of London cityscape. The current cathedral was built between 1675 and 1710 to replace the medieval cathedral destroyed in the Great Fire of 1666, and remained the tallest building in London until 1963. Wren's design combines an English Gothic plan with a classical Baroque exterior, topped by one of the great domes of European architecture: at 111 metres from floor to cross, it is the second-largest cathedral dome in the world after St Peter's in Rome. The dome is the visual focal point both inside and outside. Looking up from the cathedral floor into the inner dome is one of the most breathtaking architectural experiences in England, its painted ceiling recounting scenes from the life of St Paul. Three galleries within the dome structure are accessible to visitors. The Whispering Gallery at 30 metres above the cathedral floor runs around the inner dome's base; a whisper spoken against the curved wall can be heard distinctly on the opposite side, 34 metres away. The Stone Gallery at 53 metres provides the first outdoor views, and the Golden Gallery at 85 metres offers the most vertiginous 360-degree panorama over the Thames, the City skyscrapers, and Tate Modern across the river. The Crypt is the largest in Europe and contains the tombs of the Duke of Wellington (plain granite sarcophagus) and Admiral Lord Nelson (at the centre of the crossing under the dome), as well as Wren's own grave, inscribed: Si monumentum requiris, circumspice. Evensong services, held most weekdays at 5PM and on Sundays at 3:15PM, can be attended free of charge and offer a memorable choral experience in the cathedral's exceptional acoustic.