Brompton Oratory

SECRET SPOTS YOU SIMPLY HAVE TO DISCOVER

- JOSH BARRIE

London before Westminster Cathedral. It is little wonder so many emigrating Polish Catholics were drawn to it postwar; nearby were the offices of the Polish government-in-exile, so too various clubs, museums and restaurants. Today it would make for a fitting west London outing to attend mass before heading to Daquise or Ognisko, not only famous and historical Polish restaurants but two of London's best places to dine (still true today).

Daquise, like the church, was another spy hideout, this time for Kim Philby and Donald Maclean, members of the Cambridge Five.

These days, Polish worshippers are still regulars, the country's diaspora large in the area, but the church attracts expatriates from just about everywhere, such is its significance. On any given day, priests will be in attendance and a small number of visitors will shuffle into a church so grand within that it would not be hyperbolic to label it breathtaking.

At the Oratory, there is marble just about everywhere, while dainty windows cast pockets of light across colours of red, green and royal blue and onto white walls etched brightly in gold. Above, ceilings are covered in

saintly murals, patterns and stucco; paintings are laid into pillared apse chapels that branch out from the nave wider, even, than that at St Paul’s Cathedral with its carved arches and creaking wooden floor. At the back, on a candled altar, drapery and finery abound, as if Catholics in all their unapologetic splendour wish only to double down on what some perceive to be frippery.