St Vedast-alias-Foster
Parish Church of St Vedast-alias-Foster
St Vedast is an Anglican church in the Catholic tradition, situated on Foster Lane in the City of London. This author used to imagine that St Vedast was a modest man of God who went around pretending to be some ordinary bloke called Foster, but it turns out that Foster is an English corruption of Vedast, who was a sixth-century French bishop.
The church is traditionally claimed to have been established by 1170. It has been altered, enlarged and restored many times and probably rebuilt at least twice, the last time by Christopher Wren after the Great Fire of London. It was completely burnt out during the Blitz and restored in the mid-1950s.
The photograph below shows the now spooky-looking cherubim carved on the keystone above the west front door by the stonemason Edward Strong in the 1690s, a job for which he charged £5. The beautiful and ornate church interior is much better preserved.
