Climbing Buildings On TV

Now that's what we call cultural abseiling - inside the dome of St Paul's Cathedral - images by Amy Tookman

And on the outside - Amy Tookman

More climbing stuff on the BBC, this time with a more architectural sort of flavour as a new series, Climbing Great Buildings prepares to hit the screen.

It pretty much does what it says on the tin with Dr Jonathan Foyle, an architectural historian scaling some of Britain's most impressive buildings as a way of uncovering the buildings' unseen oddities and describing the history of architecture and construction over the past 1000 years or so.

One snag is that Foyle is a non-climber, so he's assisted in his ascents by Marmot UK sponsored athlete, Lucy Creamer, who helps him out with his rope work and does some pretty spectacular stuff along the way.

There's an amazing photo on Lucy's blog of herself, Jonathan Foyle and specialist climbing cameraman Ian Burton – he also filmed on the Asgard Project – free abseiling 270 feet inside the dome of St Paul's Cathedral.

On her blog, Lucy describes the experience as 'an amazing privilege and one of the most spectacular abseils I’ve ever done.' She also tells us that despite his lack of climbing experience, Jonathan Foyle managed to keep it all together despite being asked to do some 'pretty crazy things' like that abseil inside St Paul's.

The images, all by Amy Tookman are pretty spectacular too and we're guessing the programmes should be visually stunning.

The series begins next Monday 6 September, 2010 at 18.30 on BBC Two and BBC HD with Durham Cathedral, then Lincoln Cathedral and Caernarfon Castle on the next two nights before going daily on weeknights for the next three weeks. More details at www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00tr6g1.