When Merchant Taylors’ left the City of London in 1933, it ended a period of 372 years in the City. The Service of Thanksgiving and Commemoration at St Paul’s Cathedral last Friday celebrated the School’s connections with the City of London and acknowledged its long history and traditions.
Suffolk Lane was home to MTS from 1561 to 1875. The Merchant Taylors’ Company purchased a building called the Manor of the Rose which was later destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666.
The Rebuilding Act of 1667 ruled that ‘all the outsides of buildings be henceforth made of brick or stone’. Architect Robert Hooke designed the new school building, and for 314 years the School remained at this site until it was deemed too cramped and dilapidated.
Charterhouse Square, 1875-1933
When Charterhouse School moved to Surrey in 1866, the Merchant Taylors’ Company purchased its buildings which were extended and reopened as the new site of MTS on 6 April 1875. For the next 58 years, the School enjoyed its central location near the dome of St Paul’s and within the historic confines of the City.
