The evening will take place at the Art Workers’ Guild, London and online and will be made up of two parts:

6.30pm, the 2022 AGM of the Ecclesiological Society

All Members of the Society are welcome

The Annual Report and Accounts for 2021 and the agenda for this meeting can be found here:

• 2022 AGM Agenda
• Draft 2021 AGM Minutes
• Draft 2021 Accounts
• 2021 Annual Report
• Letter re Membership Rate Changes and Switch to Direct Debit

This will be followed by the Annual Lecture which is open to everyone, Members and non-Members.

7pm, Late-Georgian Churches: a reassessment, given by Dr Christopher Webster.

In the summer of 2022 his book, Late-Georgian Churches: Anglican architecture, patronage and church-going in England, 1790–1840, will be published by John Hudson Publishing. It will be the first comprehensive study of church-building in the late-Georgian period. After centuries of post-Reformation inactivity, the Church of England began to address the desperate shortage of accommodation and build on a huge scale. Almost all the leading architects were involved and, amongst approximately 1500 new churches, there are some outstanding designs; buildings of the very highest order architecturally.

The lecture will examine these churches, free from the Ecclesiological zeal that condemned them and has, for so long, prevented their serious study. It will consider them in the context of Georgian auditory worship and the period’s attitudes to the architecture of the past; it will reveal some remarkable buildings. It will also explore what church-going involved at this time.

There will be time for questions and discussion afterwards.

To reserve a copy of the book (due to be published in the summer of 2022), please email john@johnhudsonpublishing.com Hardback ISBN 978-1-7398229-0-3

For tickets please click here:

Attendance options

We are excited to be providing the option of attending the AGM and Lecture either in person, at the Art Workers’ Guild or by Zoom, for those who would like to join from home. Current government regulations suggest the ‘live’ option will be entirely feasible. Certainly, it is the organisers’ intention that the ‘live’ option will be available; only new government restrictions in place by April will remove that option. In the event of this being the situation, the event will still take place, but solely as a Zoom event.

After so long, we would love to see you in person and to enjoy a glass of wine.

However, should the ‘live’ option have to be removed as a result of government regulations, it is assumed that all those who have booked for ‘live’ attendance will be content to move to the Zoom alternative.

Venue

The Art Workers’ Guild is at 6 Queen Square, London, WC1N 3AT. Nearest tubes are Holborn or Russell Square; buses 59, 68, 168. More detailed directions can be found here https://www.artworkersguild.org/contact-us/

For those who opt to join us via Zoom, the link to the meeting will be sent a couple of days in advance.

NB: the photo is of St Mary, Paddington Green, London, designed by John Plaw and erected 1788-91. It is a one of the finest surviving interiors from the late-Georgian period, one carefully designed for the auditory worship of the age. (Photographer: Geoff Brandwood)