The arches that saved the cathedral

Wells Cathedral has one of my favourite emergency repairs anywhere, mostly because nobody would ever guess that's what it is.

By 1313, the central tower was in real trouble, cracking under its own weight as the foundations sank. A few decades later, master mason William Joy came up with the fix: three huge inverted arches crossing beneath the tower, spreading the weight out before the whole thing gave way. They're plain, almost stark, none of the carving you'd expect from a fourteenth century cathedral, and they look more like something out of the twentieth century than the medieval one. Nearly seven hundred years on, they're still exactly where they were put, still doing the job.

I painted it in watercolour and ink, that pale stone against the sky. There's a poster with a letter home and a postcard if you'd like one.

Shop the poster here: Wells Cathedral, Somerset · Travel Poster