Just over a month after Liam Payne – the singer and songwriter who rose to international fame as a member of British boy band One Direction – tragically died in Buenos Aires at the age of 31, Payne’s friends and family gathered in a 12th-century church in Amersham, not far outside London, for a memorial service on Wednesday.

Payne’s former bandmates Harry Styles, Zayn Malik, Louis Tomlinson and Niall Horan were among those who paid their respects and reunited en masse for the first time since One Direction’s On the Road Again tour in 2015. (The group formally disbanded in 2016.)

Malik leaves Liam Payne’s memorial in Amersham, England, on Wednesday.

Photo: Getty Images

“We are completely devastated by the news of Liam’s passing,” Styles, Malik, Tomlinson and Horan said in a joint statement on Instagram shortly after news of Payne’s death broke. “The memories we shared with him will be cherished forever. For now, our thoughts are with his family, his friends and the fans who loved him alongside us. We will miss him terribly. We love you Liam.”

In his own statement on Instagram, Styles added that “(Payne)’s greatest joy was making other people happy, and it was an honor to stand next to him as he did that.”

In addition to Styles, Malik, Tomlinson and Horan, mourners at Wednesday’s memorial service included Simon Cowell and his fiancée Lauren Silverman, James Corden and Girls Aloud singer Cheryl Tweedy, who dated Payne from 2016 to 2018 and is the mother of his seven children. year-old son, Bear Grey. Payne’s parents, Geoff and Karen, were also present, as was his girlfriend at the time of his death, actress Katie Cassidy, accompanied by Elizabeth Hurley’s son Damian Hurley.