The Ark flanked by menorahs, with the rose window behind and the almemar (pulpit) in the foreground.
It is impossible to attribute the New West End Synagogue in Bayswater to a single architectural style, although it unmistakably belongs to the late Victorian period, when neo-gothicism boomed and red brick and terracotta were being liberally applied to both sacred and secular buildings. There is also a suggestion of Moorish Revivalism, and other influences on the building have been described as Saracenic, Byzantine, Assyrian, Neo-Grecian, Orientalist and Romanesque. Most commentators and architectural writers quickly settle on the word ‘eclectic’.
The consecration of the synagogue in 1879 came at a time of growing self-confidence for the Jewish community in London. Judaism in early-nineteenth-century Britain had undergone a cautious emancipation into social acceptability. Scholars have described how an English form of Judaism had first evolved. In the words of a past president of the New West End, ‘the United Synagogue was the Anglican Church, Jewish division’, with some Jewish ministers of the time wearing clerical collars and preferring the title ‘Reverend’. Synagogues built early in the century had been much in the Christian style. In case of the New West End Synagogue, however, the interior in particular was created as lavishly and exotically Jewish.
The Ark flanked by menorahs, with the rose window behind and the almemar (pulpit) in the foreground.
A key event had been the appointment of the first Jewish Member of Parliament, Baron Lionel de Rothschild, in 1858, and he became a main patron of the new synagogue, making a grant towards the purchase of the site in Bayswater, an area where many prosperous and prominent members of the community had settled. Another force behind the building was banker Samuel Montagu, later Lord Montagu. Leaders selected the architect George Audsley, who had already designed a synagogue in Liverpool, which had pioneered an emphatically Jewish cultural style. Rothschild laid the New West End Synagogue foundation stone in 1877.
Torah scrolls.
The Ark is made of marble and alabaster, topped with a canopy comprising a gilded cupola and minarets. High behind in the west wall is a rose window, one of two in the synagogue, which are the clearest examples of straightforward gothicism in the design. The equally lavish pulpit is placed centrally.
Some forty stained glass side windows are by Nathaniel Westlake, and these date from 1905. However, for the most part, the synagogue remains in its original condition, with the exception of a few later additions in the form of alabaster wall linings and smoothly executed marble coverings for the iron columns. As in almost every religious building in Britain, there is a memorial for members of congregation who died in two World Wars.
Memorial for members of congregation who died in two World Wars.
Several detailed features are almost rendered unseen by the complexity and sheer opulence of the decoration. The bimah (the central platform from where the reading is done) is supported by forty-nine columns, each of which is decorated differently. High in the prayer hall the spandrels (the curved areas above the arches) are filled with marble panels, again each of them with different design of embellishment.
Facing the Ark, with scrolls behind and cupola and minarets above.
Patron Samuel Montagu was a man of considerable girth. From the start his seat in the front row to the left of the Ark had the centre armrest removed, and it remains that way today.
Just 130 years after the foundation stone was laid, the synagogue received Grade I listing. In 2007, English Heritage raved in its recommendation for listing, citing mostly the quality and diversity of the interior decoration, and its historical significance. It even noted the brass fittings of the lighting system. Electrical lighting was introduced to the synagogue before the nineteenth century was done, and it is rated as one of the most complete late Victorian examples remaining.