Chapel Royal, St James
Chapel Royal, St James’s Palace
The Chapel Royal stands inside St James’s Palace, Westminster, a Royal Peculiar serving the Sovereign. It is not separately listed: Historic England’s Grade I entry (NHLE 1264851, listed 5 February 1970) is for St James’s Palace, garden walls, Marlborough Gate and related fabric, and the official list description includes the chapel.
- Location
- St James, Greater London
- Country
- England
- County
- Greater London
- City / town
- St James
- Address
- St James's Palace, St James, Greater London, SW1A 1BL
- Postcode
- SW1A 1BL
- Built
- 1530s as part of Henry VIII’s palace; ceiling dated 1540; remodelled by Sir Robert Smirke c.1836–37
- Architect
- Sir Robert Smirke (1836–37 remodelling)
- Denomination
- Royal Peculiar
- Grade
- I
- Style
- Tudor, with nineteenth-century redecoration
- Materials
- Tudor brick with stone dressings (palace fabric); panelled chapel interior
- Opening hours
- The chapel is rarely open to the public, although sometimes takes part in London Open House. The public can attend Sunday services at the Chapel Royal and the Queen's Chapel.
- Access
- Non-accessible toilets in church. Level access to the main areas. Accessible toilets nearby. Accessible toilets in church
Overview
The palace was built for Henry VIII in the 1530s on the site of the hospital of St James. The list description places the Chapel Royal between Colour Court and Ambassadors’ Court, a college-chapel T-plan of the 1530s, largely redecorated around 1836, with a panelled ceiling of painted Renaissance motifs dated 1540. The Royal Household records the ceiling as copied from the ambulatory vault of Santa Costanza in Rome and associated with the marriage of Henry VIII and Anne of Cleves; carving over the main door bears the arms of Elizabeth I. Sir Robert Smirke reduced the royal closet and enlarged the chapel in 1836, adding oak panelling and a new south ceiling with the cyphers of William IV and Queen Adelaide. The chapel was damaged by blast in the Second World War and later restored. Public access is limited; Sunday services are held at the Chapel Royal and at the nearby Queen’s Chapel (Inigo Jones), which has its own history.
The Chapel Royal is an establishment of priests and singers as well as a room. Since the loss of the Whitehall chapel by fire in 1698 it has been based here.