To spot All Saints Church, just look ahead for a large, grey stone building with tall gothic windows and a square tower on the left side topped with a bright blue clock-its medieval walls and old gravestones make it hard to miss!
Now, let’s step back in time-imagine the year is 1395 and a determined Archbishop named William Courtenay is pacing about, hat askew, planning something grand. Right where you’re standing, he decided to build a church so majestic, it’s been called the “grandest Perpendicular style church in Kent.” That’s not just a fancy title-it means you’re looking at a building designed to wow, with towering windows, sturdy buttresses, and even a crenellated top, just like a castle!
Courtenay had set up this church as the heart of his College of All Saints, replacing an older, smaller place of worship dedicated to St Mary. They say he was so determined that even after he passed away the very next year, his dream pressed on-another Archbishop named Thomas Arundel took the plans and finished the work by 1398, all with the help of support from King Richard II (not a bad friend to have, right?). Richard wasn’t shy either; he donated land and income from local parishes and even the Hospital of St Peter and St Paul here in Maidstone.
But get this-building this all wasn’t cheap. Courtenay actually got special permission from the Pope to charge all the churches in his territory fourpence in the pound to fund it. Imagine the church collection plate after that announcement!
After the college closed in the 1500s during England’s wild religious shakeups, the church became Maidstone’s parish church, holding itself together even as its lands went bouncing from noble family to noble family-including George Brooke, who later lost it all when accused of high treason in a plot against King James I! You can almost hear the tension in the air when you remember that.
This church isn’t just stone and glass-it’s full of memory. Inside, there’s a chapel once used by the Fraternity of Corpus Christi, choir stalls with ancient, hand-carved misericords, and the resting places of people who shaped Maidstone’s history. Monuments celebrate everyone from the first master of the college, John Wotton, to the Astley family and even William Shipley, who founded the Royal Society of Arts. Outside, old gravestones rest under the green hush of trees, and the medieval churchyard wall whispers secrets of centuries past.
If you look up at the tower (which used to have a spire until lightning zapped it in 1730), picture a set of ten bells hanging inside. They’re still rung today by local bell-ringers, filling the town with music. Around you, the River Medway flows by, and just to the north-west sits the grand Archbishop’s Palace.
The clock you see was made in 1899, but don’t worry if you see it ticking along-when it strikes, it plays the famous Westminster chimes! So, the next time those bells ring, imagine the centuries of villagers, monks, and noblemen who heard the same chimes and stood just where you’re standing, marveling at Maidstone’s grand heart-All Saints Church.
