"Fairytale" flat in converted church tower available to rent for £1,153 a week

Living successful a converted church could beryllium heaven, but erstwhile the existent proprietor of this flat successful the doorbell operation of St Thomas’ successful London Bridge took it on, it was sinking downwards — literally.

“St Thomas the Apostle was derelict and successful request of love. The depository successful the attic didn’t person a lease, the gathering was held unneurotic by a metallic strap and had dropped a fewer inches arsenic the Jubilee enactment was heavy beneath it,” Richard Upton told Homes & Property.

Luckily for the Grade II-listed building, Upton is an adept successful conservation.

Built successful 1703 by Thomas Cartwright — designer to Sir Christopher Wren — St Thomas’s served arsenic a religion to the adjacent hospital. The attic utilized to service arsenic the store for apothecary herbs utilized successful healing by doctors astatine St Thomas’ Hospital, earlier becoming a women’s operating theatre betwixt 1822 to 1862.

Upton purchased the full religion connected St Thomas thoroughfare successful 2006 and enlisted architecture signifier AHMM to crook the disused belfry into a unsocial apartment, which is present disposable to rent for £4,996 a period with Dexters.

Set implicit 5 storey’s, the two-bedroom location makes the astir of the historical architecture. The aged brickwork near has been near bare, and the arched windows person been preserved.

Accessed via a backstage lift, the flat occupies the 3rd to seventh floors of the tower. A glass-walled staircase leads to the topmost floor, featuring a expansive rainfall ablution lit from above.

“The staircase is fabulous — it utilized to pb to the bells of the religion and present it takes you up to an unthinkable bath with beauteous views implicit London and St Pauls,” says Upton.

The little floors are good equipped for entertaining, successful benignant with a expansive room featuring acheronian oak cabinetry and a moody achromatic marble splashback, and a ample eating table.

A main chamber occupies the 4th floor, with arched windows and a Juliet balcony providing views implicit London. The 2nd chamber is connected the 5th floor, and the reception country fills the sixth storey.

The ambiance wrong the level is unique, says Upton. “The expansive architecture and brushed lighting make a medieval, fairytale-like environment.”

History buffs volition bask the location, with Europe’s oldest surviving operating theatre connected site. Following Upton’s conservation work, the gathering present contains the Old Operating Theatre and Herb Garret, with acquisition displays astir the past of country and medicine.

The surgical ward is adjacent to the hospital, and women undergoing country would beryllium moved adjacent doorway to the ward to recover. Surgery for the little income women undergoing procedures successful the 19th period were semi-public affairs, with students packing the raised amphitheatre-style seating to observe the surgeons astatine work.

Prior to 1847 determination was nary anaesthetic beyond chloroform oregon alcohol, and sawdust was utilized to sorb the humor that spilled from the operating table.

Less gruesomely, Florence Nightingale acceptable up her nursing schoolhouse astatine St Thomas’s Hospital successful 1859, and it was upon her proposal that the infirmary yet moved to its caller tract successful Lambeth. The aged operating country was boarded up successful 1862 and was forgotten until its re-discovery successful 1957.

Renters looking to bask surviving successful specified a portion of London’s past tin present bash truthful for £1,153 a week.

“The building’s archetypal features are preserved and balanced with the apartment’s modern touches, perfect for modern living,” said Chris Ferguson,” committee manager astatine Dexters. “It is simply a 1 of a benignant spot successful a precise sought-after location.”

Upton thinks it would entreaty to those who “love authentic unsocial spaces” and “someone eccentric who loves past — and to look implicit the capital.”