Harry Mount

All human life – and death – is here: the British parish church

As a skilled stonemason, Andrew Ziminski has dug deep into the fabric of countless churches and can explain every conceivable aspect, from baptismal fonts to gravestones

Interior of the parish church of Wingfield, Suffolk. [Geography Photos/Universal Images Group via Getty Images] 
issue 02 November 2024

In ‘Church Going’, the poem that gives this charming book its title, Philip Larkin talks about ‘one of the crew that tap and jot and know what rood-lofts were… Some ruin-bibber, randy for antique’. Well, Andrew Ziminski is king of the ruin-bibbers, randy for antique churches. He doesn’t just know what a rood-loft is; he’s also repaired loads of them.

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