Wren, Christopher (1632–1723)

One of Sir Christopher Wren's unexecuted designs for St Paul's Cathedral, London. The cathedral was to have been the centrepiece of a new urban plan, designed by Wren, for the City of London following the Great Fire. The scheme was rejected as it was felt it would interfere with the city's commercial life. In 1669, a different design of Wren's for the cathedral was accepted.

St Paul's Cathedral, London, England. Although immense damage was caused in the immediate vicinity, the building survived the second great fire of London in 1940, caused by a blitz of incendiary bombs during World War II.

The Monument, in the City of London, England. The Monument's height of 67 m/220 ft supposedly commemorates the distance from its base to the bakery in Pudding Lane where the fire started.

English architect. His ingenious use of a refined and sober baroque style can be seen in his best-known work, St Paul's Cathedral, London (1675–1711), and in the many churches he built in London including St Mary-le-Bow, Cheapside (1670–77), and St Bride's, Fleet Street (1671–78). His other works include the Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford (1664–69), Greenwich Hospital, London (begun 1694), and Marlborough House, London (1709–10; now much altered).

Wren was born at East Knoyle, Wiltshire, the son of a vicar. After studying science and mathematics at Oxford University, he became professor of Astronomy at Gresham College, London, in 1657 and Savilian Professor of Astronomy, Oxford, in 1661.

Wren turned to architecture in about 1662, when he designed the chapel of Pembroke College, Cambridge. After the Fire of London in 1666, he prepared a plan for rebuilding the city on classical lines, incorporating piazzas and wide avenues, but it was not taken up. Instead, he was employed to design and supervise the rebuilding of St Paul's and 51 City churches. He showed great skill both in fitting his buildings into the irregular sites of the destroyed churches, and in varying the designs, giving them a series of towers that characterized the London skyline until the bombing raids of World War II destroyed much of the old City.

In 1669 Wren became surveyor-general of the King's Works; his projects included building and renovations at Hampton Court, Kensington, St James's, Westminster, Whitehall, Winchester, Windsor Castle, and Chelsea Hospital (1682–85). His numerous other buildings include Emmanuel College Chapel (1665–76) and Trinity College Library (1676–84) at Cambridge; ‘Tom Tower’ (Christ Church) and extensions to Queen's College and Trinity College at Oxford; the Royal Observatory, Greenwich; the churches of St Clement Danes and St James, Piccadilly, in west London; sundry work in the Middle Temple, London; and additions to Christ's Hospital, London. However, the west towers of Westminster Abbey, often attributed to him, were actually the design of his pupil Nicholas Hawksmoor.

Wren was knighted in 1673. At the bicentenary of his death (1923), the Wren Society, founded in his honour, began the publication of 20 large volumes recording his architectural work. His biography was written by his son under the title Parentalia (1750).