St Paul’s Triforium
St Paul’s Cathedral is not exactly an unknown destination in London, with over 1 million visitors every year. However, most of these stick to sightseeing in the nave or crypt, unaware of a secret space between the inner and out walls of the building: the triforium. Taking a tour to visit the passages running high above the nave, it felt rather like going backstage – or, as the guide put it, going up to St Paul’s attic.
Indeed, the triforium houses many items that seem like they have been put up there because there’s nowhere for them in the main part of the cathedral, but they might come in useful one day. These include old pulpits, shelves stacked with rubble from the previous St Paul’s, “cartoons” for stained-glass windows, and busts of various historical figures. The tour also takes in a view from above the western entrance, looking down the length of the nave, flanked on either side by electric trumpets (installed for the Queen but no longer played – apparently Her Majesty found them rather loud.
There are two definite highlights of the tour. The first is the library with its intricate carvings – not to mention that on walking in the visitor is immediately hit with a wonderfully musty smell of books. The second is the trophy room – no longer containing the spoils of Nelson’s battles (hence its name), but instead a 1:24 scale model produced by the architect Christopher Wren, showing his original design for the cathedral – familiar, yet distinctly different from the building all Londoners know today.
