17 Jul 2026
A striking new addition to the St Albans art scene has appeared this week, as celebrated artist Ant Steel unveiled large-scale murals featuring two of the city’s most important historical figures – St Alban and Boudicca.
The murals at café and deli the Silver Palate in Market Place are the result of a collaboration between Ant and owner Adrian van Dijk, who commissioned the pieces as a tribute to the city’s deep and layered history.
“I have a great respect for the city of St Albans,” said Adrian. “I wanted a serious subject that reflected the history of the city, not just something decorative on the wall.”
That ambition led naturally to two of the most resonant names in the city’s story: St Alban, Britain’s first recorded Christian martyr, who gave the city its name and its cathedral, and Boudicca, the warrior queen of the Iceni who led the revolt that saw Roman Verulamium burned to the ground in CE 60 or 61.
Ant is a creative brand director who has worked with the likes of Samsung, Nestlé, Unilever, Apple, Red Bull and Gillette, and having spent time as the Cathedral’s artist in residence has become closely associated with the saint’s legacy.
“I hadn’t had the opportunity before of painting the martyr St Alban, and this so was a dream come true,” Ant explained.
Boudicca, meanwhile, clearly holds a special place in the artist’s imagination: “She is such a marvellous character. I love painting her.”
Customers entering the new upstairs area of the Silver Palate will first come face to face with St Alban, and then up the next flight of stairs there is Boudicca. St Alban represents the city’s Christian and Roman-era heritage from the perspective of faith and sacrifice, while Boudicca embodies resistance to Roman rule and the fierce independence of pre-Roman Britain: two very different, and at times opposing, threads in the story of the same ground.
Ant’s style, developed over a career that began in graphic design before moving into large- scale public and community art, is known for its vivid colour and highly realistic detail which is a departure from the traditional graffiti tag, and one that has made him a popular choice for commissions across the city, including the mural of St Albans’ election scandal of 1851 in Sovereign Way, the alleyway just off Market Place.
For Adrian, the murals are as much about place-making as decoration: “People come to the Silver Palate to eat and have coffee, but I want them to leave feeling something about where they are.
“St Albans has an extraordinary history, and it deserves to be seen, not just read about in a guidebook.”
The murals are now on permanent display at the Silver Palate, where they are expected to become a talking point for locals and visitors alike. They are a reminder, painted large across the walls, that the city’s history is never far from the surface.
