I completed the first two pages in this set during 2001 and then changed my original plans. Late that year I was made redundant and thus no longer had lunch-hours to wander round taking photographs (although the concept of a lunch hour had become increasingly abstract in any case). The project got consigned to my "to do list" directory and it was not until 2003 that I revived it. There is, in fact, a link between the firt two churches and the last. In 2001 the feast of Our Lady of Walsingham was celebrated for the first time. At the time it was heavily overshadowed by the events of a couple of weeks earlier, but I resolved to visit Walsingham and its Black Madonna.
But there's another Black Madonna, much closer to where I live (although given the vagaries of London's public transport system it can take almost as long to get there. I'd been past the place many times on trips to see various ISPs who have congregated in Park Royal. Willesden may seem an incongruous place for a Marian shrine, but in fact the veneration of this figure may go back as far as the tenth century. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries this was a famous shrine in the leafy countryside. Nowadays, approached uphill from the tube station, the church is on a bustling arterial road. It's fair to say that the architecture lacks the Byzantine refinement of, say, Westminster, but it still manages to dominate its surroundings and is clearly well-loved.
The entry to the church is in a marginally courtyard, but once inside, the church is a veritable oasis of peace. The nave is fairly plain, offsetting the dark wood Stations of the Cross with elegantly gilded haloes. At the far end is an ornate altar and the side walls are ranged with statues of saints. The main focus, however, is the adoration room, which contains the Madonna image. This brightly lit chapel is separated from the nave by a glass wall. It's sometimes locked, but the statue is always visible.
The church is the centre of a lively multi-cultural community. Photographing the statues took a long time, because I didn't want to intrude on the meditation of a number of women praying the stations and lighting candles in front of each saint. As a moving meditation this obviously takes a significant length of time and I eventually gave up waiting to get a picture of the nave – there's always another day and for me, not intruding is much more important than getting the shot.
It was just before Candlemas (we were going to Walsingham the next day) and I wondered whether this had anything to do it, but I found the men later on, drinking Guinness, watching the racing and waiting for their partners. It appears that this is a regular activity.
The Madonna is beautiful (it was restored a few years ago) but here are many other details if you look. This, above the entrance, is a ceramic plaque of the Virgin looking down on a dead monk with a lily growing out of his mouth. This is Cantiga 24 from the Cantigas de Santa Maria. I think it's the badge of the Guild of Our Lady of Willesden. I've seen it only once before, in the Lady Chapel of Winchester Cathedral. There, it's one of many images. It would be fascinating to know why this specific one was chosen for Willesden, and indeed if it was there before the formtion of the guild, or whether it's new.