Derby Cathedral

The Cathedral Church of All Saints, known simply as Derby Cathedral, anchors the historic quarter of the city centre. The 212-foot tower, built between 1510 and 1530, is among the oldest surviving parts of the building and dominates the city skyline from several approaches. The wrought-iron screen inside, made by the local smith Robert Bakewell around 1730, is considered one of the finest examples of English decorative ironwork.

The cathedral contains the tomb of Bess of Hardwick, the formidably ambitious 16th-century builder and noblewoman who constructed Hardwick Hall in Derbyshire. The building is open to visitors daily and free to enter, and the Cathedral Quarter around it — a pedestrianised zone of old streets running north from the market — is worth a slow wander.

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A story
The tower of Derby Cathedral is one of the finest Perpendicular Gothic towers in England, completed around 1530 — but the nave behind it was demolished and rebuilt in 1725 by the architect James Gibbs, who gave it a thoroughly Georgian interior that sits incongruously behind the medieval facade. Gibbs later designed St Martin-in-the-Fields in London; Derby is where he first found his confidence.