Tuesday 18 September at 7.00 p.m.

in conversation with Rosemary Hill

The village of Wreay in Cumbria is home to one of the most remarkable of Victorian buildings, St Mary’s Church. In The Pinecone, Jenny Uglow, biographer of Thomas Bewick and ‘the Lunar Men’, tells the story of its equally remarkable creator Sarah Losh, described by Simon Jenkins in England’s 1000 Best Churches as ‘an individual genius, a Charlotte Bronte of wood and stone.’ In Uglow’s hands, the ramifications of this beautiful little building spread out to encompass the radical politics of the early 19th century, the Afghan War, the coming of the railways and the birth of modern geology. Most of all, though, her book is a celebration of the art of making, and of the skills of the local craftsmen who worked under Sarah Losh’s direction. Jenny Uglow will be in conversation about the book with Rosemary Hill, contributing editor at the LRB, and author of God's Architect: Pugin and the Building of Romantic Britain. Of St Mary's Church, she has written, ‘it is one of the most interesting buildings in England. In the history of the architectural crafts… it is unique.’