LONDON city churches

An occasional saunter through the churches of the Square Mile

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St Bartholomew the Less

This church is one of the City of London's best-kept secrets, but the City has so many best-kept secrets that it is hard to wander around it without stumbling upon at least one of them. To find St Bartholomew the Less you will need to enter the gates of St Bartholomew's hospital, for this church is the hospital chapel. Until 2015 it was also a parish church, a unique combination in England, but the parish boundaries have been redrawn and St Bartholomew the Less now has the status of a chapel of ease within the parish of St Bartholomew the Great, whose church lies a hundred yards off.

The church had acquired parish status in the 1540s at the time of the Reformation, and was rebuilt in a pleasing Georgian octagonal shape from the 1790s by George Dance the Younger, the work completed under his direction by Thomas Hardwick by the 1820s. The tower survives from the late medieval church.

Of all City churches, St Bartholomew the Less can be guaranteed to be open all day, every day, and so you will be able to step into its simple, pleasing and in some ways surprising interior. The floor is raised, a theatrical effect, and the sanctuary contributed by Hardwick gives the building focus. The linenfold woodwork is delightful. The jolly postwar glass (the church suffered blast damage) is by Hugh Easton, not always a safe pair of hands but here he was on top form.

Most of the memorials are to former surgeons and doctors associated with the church, but Easton's windows remember the nurses. Most unusually for the City of London churches, St Bartholomew the Less has brasses, and these contribute to the feel of a church which is quite different to any of its City compatriots.

On my last visit I was followed into the church by four Italian tourists, who quickly realised their mistake and headed back out to find St Bartholomew the Great. The only other visitor was a woman in a dressing gown who lit a candle and sobbed quietly. Sometimes you need this in the City to remind you what the churches are actually there for.