St Michael, Cambridge

Twas Michaelmas season

They'd got corn and pears in

And all the fields cleared save some rakings and thythes

Cote prygon flocks muster

Round beans shelling cluster

And done are the whettings o reap hooks and scythes.

     It is Michaelmas.  A blustery day here, with leaves spinning across the sky on the wind.  I suppose we all ought to be eating goose.  Here, however, are the photos I took of the exterior of St Michael's church in Cambridge. 

     After photographing the exterior of Great St Mary, I braved the rush hour 'crowds' and photographed St Michael's.  The church stands on Trinity St., a few hundred feet north of Great St Mary.  Not as grand as its southern neighbour, nor as unprepossessing as St Edward and St Benet further s.  Oblong plan with projecting s tower and n porch.  The tower like that of St Edward is very plain, but none the worse for that; it originally had a blunt, diminutive lead spire.  Short nave, longer chancel.  Mainly Decorated Gothic.  Fine west window. S. aisle plastered, whitewashed, and scored to resemble ashlar masonry.

     The church essentially belongs to the rebuilding undertaken from 1325 onwards when it also became the chapel for the now defunct college, Michaelhouse.  It was later also used simultaneously by Gonville College.  Both colleges were eventually subsumed into other institutions, Michaelhouse into Trinity, and Gonville into Gaius, and St Michael became parochial once more. With the growth of the colleges, commencing in the 1820s, the parish was slowly denuded of parishioners until in 1908 parish was amalgamated with that of Great St Mary.  It entered into a period of some uncertainty for much of the twentieth century.  Various alternative uses were proposed and then rejected.  Eventually it became used as a parish hall.  The chancel, and s chancel aisle, were retained for worship, and the nave and the north aisle repurposed.  Kitchen, toilets etc were installed in 1966.  George Pace was the architect.  Controversially, work including a brick wall betwixt the nave and chancel.  In 2002, St Michael's became the 'Michaelhouse Centre', more popularly known as 'Michaelhouse Café'.  The interior was redesigned by Archimage, and included the removal of Pace's brick wall.