St Pancras station has long been celebrated as a masterpiece of Victorian Gothic architecture, and now we’re celebrating its 150th birthday as well.
The station (now known as St Pancras International) welcomes around 50 million visitors every year, many of whom come to hop aboard a Eurostar train to Paris, Amsterdam or one of six other destinations in Europe.
To celebrate the sesquicentenary of St Pancras station – surely London’s most magnificent train station – here’s a look back at some of the incredible stories from its remarkable history…
Like most buildings of significance in London, St Pancras station suffered bomb damage during the Blitz in World War II. In 1942, a 500kg bomb broke through the roof of the train shed, causing significant damage to platforms 3 and 4, but thanks to the ‘Spirit of the Blitz’ and some seriously fast emergency repairs, they managed to get things back on track in just a week.
The original Saint Pancras was a Christian orphan who was martyred in Rome. The story goes that in the 4th-century, he was beheaded by the Roman Emperor Diocletian for refusing to renounce his Christian faith. He was only 14 years old. To this day he’s a patron saint of children (but apparently his name is also invoked against cramps, false witnesses, headaches and perjury!).
Pretty much anyone who’s passed through St Pancras will have seen the Yamaha piano that takes pride of place in the station concourse. It’s been there since 2016, when Elton John not only donated it, but also played a few songs during a morning rush hour. He signed the piano with the inscription “Enjoy this piano, it’s a gift. Love, Elton John”. Anyone who wants to play can sit down and tickle the ivories – celebs to have done so include Jools Holland, John Legend and Bill Bailey.
The pearly tradition can be traced back to St Pancras, thanks to a man named Henry Croft, who cleaned the streets around the station. In order to raise money for the St Pancras orphanage that was his home until he was 13, Croft bedazzled a suit with mother-of-pearl buttons and voilà! The first pearly king of London was born.
The frontispiece of St Pancras railway station is the five-star St. Pancras Renaissance Hotel London. It sits on the site of George Gilbert Scott’s showy Grand Midland Hotel, which opened in 1873 and closed in 1935. Maybe its closure was something to do with the fact that there were 300 rooms and only nine baths? We’re just speculating.
The new hotel opened in 2011 with a star-studded party – but the building should be totally used to celebs and the movie-star life, as it’s featured in films including Richard III, starring Ian McKellen (1995), Christopher Nolan’s Batman Begins (2005) and The Secret Garden (1993). Its entrance and main staircase were even the location for the Spice Girls’ 1996 music video for ‘Wannabe’! Zig-a-zig-ah.
When the station opened, the arched train shed boasted the largest single-span roof in the world: 74.8 metres wide. It was created using a series of wrought iron ‘ribs’ and the design was copied across the world, including Grand Central Station in New York.
Speaking of the roof at St Pancras International, it’s also home to a number of beehives. They’re owned by the posh department store, Fortnum and Mason which, in 2013, opened a spin-off store at St Pancras – its first in 300 years. Fortnum & Mason keeps bees on a number of rooftops – as well as St Pancras and its own store in Piccadilly, it has hives at Somerset House, Hoxton in East London and on top of the White Cube Gallery in the heart of Bermondsey.
If you’re thirsty and love some bubbles, head upstairs – St Pancras is home to Europe’s longest Champagne bar!
The Nazis failed to reduce St Pancras to rubble, but the British Railways Board almost managed it, in 1966. The station escaped planned demolition thanks in no small part to John Betjeman (later poet laureate of the UK), who launched a campaign that granted the building Grade I listing. When St Pancras reopened in 2007, following extensive renovations and expansion – at a cost of £800 million (approx AU$1.46 billion) – Betjeman was honoured with a larger-than-life-size bronze statue on The Grand Terrace. Oh, and a pub, the Betjeman Arms.
As well as the statue of Sir John Betjeman (above), the station is also home to The Meeting Place — a nine-metre-high, 20-tonne bronze statue of a couple locked in an embrace. Revealed in 2007, it’s reported to have cost £1 million (approx AU$1.8m).
The statue stands on the upper level of the station, underneath a new piece of art that also celebrates the romance of the place. Created by the ‘bad girl of British art’, Tracey Emin, the 20-metre-long work sits directly below the St Pancras clock and greets commuters arriving at St Pancras with the words, I Want My Time With You.