St Margaret's Church Westminster: Beside the Abbey

Short answer: St Margaret’s is the smaller church standing between Westminster Abbey and Parliament Square. It is a 12th-century foundation, rebuilt between 1486 and 1523, and is known as “the parish church of the House of Commons”. Entry is free, it is run by the Abbey, and it is open Monday to Saturday in the late morning and afternoon.

What is St Margaret’s Church, and why is it next to the Abbey?

St Margaret’s was built so that local people had their own church beside the monastery. Wikipedia says the Benedictine monks of the Abbey founded it in the 12th century as a simpler parish church for the people who lived around them. The Abbey describes it as “the Church on Parliament Square”.

The church you see now was rebuilt between 1486 and 1523, prompted by Henry VII, and consecrated on 9 April 1523. Since the Westminster Abbey and Saint Margaret Westminster Act 1972, it is no longer a parish church. It sits under the Dean and Chapter of Westminster Abbey. Together with the Abbey and the Palace of Westminster, it forms one UNESCO World Heritage Site, listed in 1987.

The parish church of the House of Commons

The church’s link with Parliament goes back more than 400 years. Wikipedia says it became the parish church of the Palace of Westminster in 1614. The Abbey’s own page notes it is “sometimes called ‘the parish church of the House of Commons’”.

Members of both Houses still worship here. The Abbey says MPs and peers attend regularly, including thanksgiving services for the lives of parliamentarians.

Churchill’s wedding and other weddings

Winston Churchill married Clementine Hozier at St Margaret’s on 12 September 1908. That is the best-known wedding in the church, but not the only one. Wikipedia lists:

• Samuel Pepys, the diarist, in 1655.
• John Milton, the poet, in 1656.
• Harold Macmillan, later Prime Minister, in 1920.
• Lord Louis Mountbatten and Edwina Ashley, in 1922.

Two famous names are buried here too. The printer William Caxton was buried here in 1491. Sir Walter Raleigh, executed in Old Palace Yard, was buried here in 1618. For royal weddings next door, see royal weddings at Westminster Abbey.

The windows

The windows span 450 years of glass. The east window is Flemish glass from 1509. It commemorates the betrothal of Catherine of Aragon to Henry VIII and passed through several owners before the parish bought it in 1758.

Other windows remember John Milton, a former parishioner, and Sir Walter Raleigh. In the south aisle, eight abstract windows by John Piper replaced Victorian glass destroyed in the Second World War. They were installed in 1966 and dedicated on 15 January 1967.

Visiting St Margaret’s

Entry is free. The Abbey lists opening hours of 11am to 3:30pm Monday to Saturday (on 27 October 2026 the church was open 11:00am to 3:30pm). The Abbey’s page also gives an earlier 3pm close on Saturday. It is closed to visitors on Sundays and on concert evenings.

On Sundays there is a 6pm Holy Communion, “said with hymns”, at which the Abbey’s choir for girls aged 11 to 17 sings. Services are free, with security checks on entry. The church also hosts lunchtime concerts; the Abbey’s listing shows a lunchtime concert on 18 November 2026, priced £0 to £10.

A visit to St Margaret’s does not include the Abbey. You need a separate ticket for that, £32 for adults on the Abbey’s site (about $43). Some guided tours include both: the private 4-hour and 5.5-hour options of the skip-the-line guided tour of Westminster Abbey, from $100, list free admission to St Margaret’s. For more to see close by, read things to do near Westminster Abbey.