St Alban, Wood Street

St Alban’s was a medieval church in Wood Street, City of London, first mentioned in parish records from 930. It stood on a site once occupied by King Offa of Mercia, who had a palace there with a chapel. After the Great Fire of London in 1666, Sir Christopher Wren rebuilt it in a late Perpendicular Gothic style, completed in 1685. The church had clustered columns, flattened pointed arches and plaster lierne vaults in the nave. In 1858–59 George Gilbert Scott added an apse during a restoration. The church was severely damaged in the Blitz of 1940 and the body demolished in 1965, leaving only its 92-foot tower. The tower, with four pinnacles, stands today on a traffic island as a private dwelling. It was designated a Grade II* listed building in 1950. The tower’s exterior appeared in the 2009 film *St Trinian’s II* and in Adam Rickitt’s music video. Visitors see a single medieval tower rising above the modern street. The stonework shows Wren’s Gothic detailing and later repairs. The tower’s four pinnacles mark its historic skyline. It remains a quiet remnant of a lost church, surrounded by office buildings. The site is small but holds layers of London’s history.