‘Welcome,’ says our guide Stuart Bellehewe, with an imperious sweep of his arm, ‘to the cathedral of shit.’ Before us rises Abbey Mills Pumping Station in all its grade II*-listed glory. It arose on east London’s marshes in 1868, giving Victorians a fecally fixated premonition of postmodernism’s fetish for mashing up architectural styles. Observe, urges Stuart, the Russian Orthodox-style cupola surmounting the cathedral, clearly quoting church design. Savour, he urges, the gothic Venetian design of the arched windows and of the corkscrew twist incorporated into the rainwater downpipes. The steeply pitched mansard roofs evoke Flemish designs; brass and copper florets on the doorways are derived from Celtic art.
Until 1940, there was more. Twin venting chimneys 212-feet high richly ornamented in Byzantine and Moorish styles and surmounted with minarets flanked the pumping station. They were demolished for fear that if the Luftwaffe bombed them they might collapse on to the pumping station.
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