Of a Fair Uniforme Making by John Phillips

Of a Fair Uniforme Making: The Building History of Beverley Minster 1188-1736

Hardcover, illustrated

240mm x 180mm, 293 pages

The book by John Phillips suggests a radical re-dating of the building of the present church after a fire which destroyed most of Beverley in 1188, taking the building back some 30 years earlier than previously thought. Using masons’ marks, and architectural comparisons with other buildings, such as Hedon church, and Fountains, Meaux and Jervaulx abbeys, the earliest eastern part of Beverley Minster has emerged as the only standing example of a number of churches designed by the same man, or group of men in the late 12th and early 13th centuries. Long compared with Lincoln Cathedral, it is now clear that Beverley and the north of England had their own clearly defined style of architecture. The book also uses the masons’ marks to explain the development of the nave of the building which was interrupted by the black death in 1348, and explores the later restorations of the building in the 18th and 19th centuries. Profusely illustrated, (some of the illustrations such as the contemporary drawing of the tomb of the 5th Earl of Northumberland who died in 1527, are published for the first time,) and with detailed plans, the new book is a comprehensive history of one of the finest Gothic churches in Britain.