Every year, countless numbers will pause at the top of Ludgate Hill and marvel at St Paul’s. Once they finish admiring Christopher Wren’s great sculpture of Portland stone, some - more than a million a year in fact - will pass through its colossal oak doors to absorb the intricate decorations of its interior, climb its grand staircases to peer over its famous whispering gallery, and dodge gaggles of schoolchildren and their backpacks to explore the secrets of its crypt.

At this point, relatively few will, as I do, turn down a modest corridor away from this undercroft and through a set of heavy, unremarkable fire doors. If they did, they would likely not be immediately impressed by the awkward, loud and busy space they were confronted with here. Originally a car park under Paternoster Square, this place now serves simultaneously as delivery entrance, security control room and storage space. 

But it’s here that the grandeur of St Paul’s is maintained, reproduced and sustained. Following the sound of a flute concertino playing from a radio, I find myself in the workshop where the cathedral’s stonemasons, carpenters and metalworkers ply their trade in the same way so many others doing similar work across the country do - out of sight and out of the public’s mind.