15/10/2026
Had a quick look behind the scenes of the new cathedral yesterday - incl. the ‘undercroft’ (as they call it) beneath the nave with staff offices, storage and a workshop - and the ‘choir’ area (where the main image is taken from).
Gave me chance to get my bearings on the astonishing scene I spotted in the ‘found’ film footage we have on display in the LTB Priory Undercrofts (part of the Coventry : then & now exhibition).
Pic 2 from the film, shows the slender pillar / honeycomb shaped ‘false ceiling’ structure open to the sky during the early construction phase c.1958. I hadn’t realised its completely free standing ie. not fixed to the outer walls - but actually you can clearly see that if you stand in the nave looking up.
Seems like it was built before the outer walls had been started - so def must have been an incredible sight at the time, soaring as it does over 80ft high like some other worldly concrete tree canopy in a sci fi novel ::).
I heard that the idea was originally to give the impression of the pillar columns ‘floating on air’ - sitting on small glass spheres - however this wasn’t deemed practical, and instead they went with slender metal rods (which tbh looks just as nuts!).
Ps. The film came from the attic of Barnard Reyner one of the architects who worked with the designer , Basil Spence - Barnard used a 16mm cine camera to record progress right through from them first chopping down trees to clear the space, the first excavations that uncovered ancient graves, construction - including the incredible maze of scaffold needed to install the roof , and then finally, the consecration ceremony attended by Elizabeth II in 1962.
(Exhibition showing Tues-Sat 12-4 until end Oct).
