Wells Cathedral

📍 Somerset, England

4.8 ★★★★½ 8,000 reviews

About

Wells Cathedral, formally the Cathedral Church of St Andrew, is a Church of England cathedral in Wells, Somerset, England. It is the seat of the bishop of Bath and Wells and the mother church of the diocese of Bath and Wells. There are daily Church of England services in the building, and in 2023 it was reported to receive over 300,000 visitors per year. The cathedral is a Grade I listed building. The cathedral precincts contain the Bishop's Palace and several buildings linked to its medieval chapter of secular canons, including the fifteenth-century Vicars' Close.

Built between 1175 and 1490, Wells is considered the first English cathedral built entirely in the Gothic style. The west front (c.1230-1250) displays over 300 medieval carved figures, the largest surviving collection of medieval sculpture in England. The famous scissor arches were added in 1338 to prevent the central tower from collapsing. Features a remarkable 14th-century astronomical clock — one of the oldest working clock mechanisms in the world.