After eight years, more than 1.5 million stitches and the dedication of hundreds of volunteers, a remarkable embroidery recreating Peterborough Cathedral‘s medieval painted Nave ceiling has been revealed in full for the first time.
From Medieval Ceiling to Modern Masterpiece: Peterborough Cathedral Reveals Medieval Nave Ceiling Depicted in Stitches
This week, Peterborough Cathedral welcomed members of the public to join the Bishop of Peterborough, the embroidery team and project supporters to see the completed work for themselves. Visitors had the opportunity to hear the fascinating history behind the project, speak to the volunteers who brought it to life, and see the extraordinary detail of the finished piece.
The finished embroidery is a large-scale needlepoint interpretation of the Cathedral’s thirteenth-century painted Nave ceiling — one of the most important surviving examples of medieval decorative schemes in England. Measuring 12 ft 2 in (approximately four metres) and containing more than 1.5 million stitches, it recreates a remarkable medieval world of kings, bishops, saints, the Seven Liberal Arts and a host of fantastical and humorous creatures.
The story of the embroidery itself is almost as remarkable as the medieval ceiling it depicts.
The project was originally commissioned in 1986 from the Royal School of Needlework by Mrs Freeman, a local supporter with close connections to the Cathedral. She died in 2008, aged 90, without the project having begun. After passing through several hands, the materials were finally gifted to the Cathedral in 2018 — the 900th anniversary of its foundation.
That same year, seven initial volunteers began stitching in May, starting what would become a hugely significant community project. Working on canvas woven at 18 threads per inch, 30 regular volunteers painstakingly reproduced the intricate medieval imagery. The design is based on William Strickland’s 1849 lithographic drawing of the original painted ceiling, but the team made careful adjustments as the work progressed to reflect the Cathedral ceiling more accurately. These included correcting the goat, originally drawn upside down, revisions to the monkey and owl panel, and refining the depiction of the organistrum player.
The imagery itself tells a fascinating story. Alongside kings, bishops and saints are the Seven Liberal Arts — Grammar, Logic, Rhetoric, Geometry, Arithmetic, Astronomy and Music — as well as the Agnus Dei and Saints Peter and Paul.
Then come the creatures: a wyvern, a harp-playing donkey, a pig-like ogre, Janus, a human cannibal, and the famous goat carrying a backwards-riding monkey with an owl.
Scholars believe the shift from sacred imagery to humorous and sometimes bizarre beasts may reflect the medieval division between the Nave, where townspeople sat, and the Quire, where monks worshipped — perhaps providing the clergy with their own medieval visual joke.
The stitching was not without its challenges. Early in the project, rotated pattern charts and the difficulty of aligning such intricate designs on fine canvas created setbacks, and initial estimates suggested completing the embroidery could take as long as 70 years. Instead, the dedication of the volunteers saw the project completed in just eight.
The final stage involved unrolling the entire canvas so the team could return to the earliest sections and complete part of the border, which had not been fully understood when the project began. For many volunteers, this meant seeing the first sections of the embroidery again for the first time in years.
The Very Reverend Chris Dalliston, Dean of Peterborough, said:
“Peterborough’s Nave ceiling is one of the most extraordinary medieval pieces of artwork in the country, but we are in awe of the wonderful team of volunteer embroiderers who have translated this into an amazing tapestry, shining a new light on this unique artefact. It has required great patience, commitment, skill and love, and involved such a big team of people. We honour their work and look forward to seeing the Bishop’s last stitch complete the picture!”
Now, with the final lozenge and border complete, the Cathedral is preparing to celebrate the finished work and consider how this extraordinary piece of modern craftsmanship and medieval history will be permanently displayed for future generations.
