The contractor, John Fitch, encountered problems with the foundations at the east end, so removed them and piled the ground. The walls were faced with brick, instead of the usual stone, and there were load-bearing Corinthian columns. Fitch's work was unsatisfactory to the parish, and his columns were later described as "specimens of... jerry-building... made up of several sorts of materials and plastered over." By 1693, the parish was lobbying Wren to pay for repairs. By 1700, the church was being shored up and was in need of repair. This was undertaken in 1713, when the upper parts of the walls were taken down and rebuilt, the slate roof was replaced with a lead roof, and a steeple was added. The total cost of rebuilding was £5,704, then a gigantic sum. The tower, also of brick, was to the west of the church. The steeple, probably designed by Robert Hooke, took the form of an octagonal drum surmounted by a lantern, from which emerged a trumpet-shaped cone. On top of this was a ball and finial, which survived the demolition and are now on the spire of St Andrew-by-the-Wardrobe. In 1839, George Godwin described St Michael's as "a plain substantial building without any striking features". It was 70 feet long and 50 feet wide, divided into a nave and aisles by Corinthian columns, which supported an elaborate entablature and a coved ceiling. The plan was irregular, and the building was smaller than the pre-Fire church. The main front was on the east side, facing onto Basinghall Street, and was unadorned except for a large round-headed window flanked by two round windows. In 1821, the brickwork was rendered with stucco and pointed in imitation of stone. Burials Sir John Gresham, 1556 Thomas Storer, 1604 Thomas Wharton, anatomist, 1673 The Harleian Society copied the parish registers and compiled a series of books in 1944. Volume 74. The work was transcribed and edited by A.W Hughes Clarke F.S.A. It lists the baptisms, marriages and burials in this parish between 1733 and 1852. It comprises 189 pages of names dates and other details. Demolition In the late 19th century, sanitary regulations obliged the church to clear its crypt of human remains. The work revealed the weakness of the foundations, and in 1892 the church was judged unsafe and was closed, its parish combined with that of St Lawrence Jewry. St Michael Bassishaw was demolished