Victoria Building, University of Liverpool
Encyclopedia
The Victoria Building, University of Liverpool, is on the corner of Brownlow Hill and Ashton Street, Liverpool
, Merseyside
, England . It has been designated by English Heritage
as a Grade II listed building. It was designed by Alfred Waterhouse
and completed in 1892. It was the first purpose-built building for what was to become the University of Liverpool
, with accommodation for administration, teaching, common rooms and a library. The building was the inspiration for the term "red brick university"
which was coined by Professor Edgar Allison Peers
. In 2008 it was converted into a museum and gallery.
was appointed as architect and money was raised towards the construction. Much of this was raised by a public appeal and the private donors included Henry Tate
, who gave £20,000 towards the building and a further £5,500 for books in the library, and William Hartley
, who paid £4,300 for the clock and bells in the tower. The builders were Brown and Backhouse and the brickwork was contracted to Joshua Henshaw and Sons. Victoria Building was officially opened in December 1892 by Lord Spencer, the Chancellor of the Victoria University
.
The building housed lecture rooms, staff offices, common rooms and, on the top floor, the Tate Library. As the university grew, departments gradually moved out of the building, which became increasingly used for administration. In 1938 the Harold Cohen Library
opened and the contents of the library were moved out of the Victoria Building. The former library became the Tate Hall which was used for exhibitions, formal events and as an examination room. In 1970 the administration moved from the Victoria Building into the Senate House. In 2008, to coincide with Liverpool being European Capital of Culture
, the building was converted into the Victoria Gallery and Museum.
brick and common brick with terracotta dressings under a slate roof. It is an L-shaped building in three storeys with 13 bays facing Brownlow Hill and five bays in Ashton Street. The southerly eight bays have alternate gable
s and gabled dormer
s. The ninth bay forms the tower. It has an arched entrance over which is an oriel window
and, above this a three-light window. Over this are the royal coat of arms
, a mosaic
panel with an inscription and machicolation
. The top stage has a four-face clock. At each angle of the tower are buttress
es which rise to form pinnacle
s with lead spirelets. Over all is a lead spire with two tiers of lucarne
s. The tenth bay has staircase windows with a gable above. The end bays curve round behind an octagonal tower with a spire.
The building is fire-proof, and constructed around an iron frame, with concrete floors. Internally the entrance hall is faced in Burmantofts terracotta
, which is mainly brown but with some blue. An arcaded
staircase leads to the first floor which has a lecture theatre occupying the apse
at the north end. The top floor consists of a large space which contained the previous library. In the entrance hall is a life-size marble
statue by Albert Bruce Joy, the University war memorial and on the stairs are memorial plaques. The clock in the tower was made by William Potts & Sons
of Leeds
. Also in the tower is a ring
of five bells cast by Taylors of Loughborough
. Each bell is inscribed with a line from Tennyson
's In Memoriam
.
, J. M. W. Turner
, Jacob Epstein
, Lucian Freud
, Elizabeth Frink and John James Audubon
. A series of special exhibitions is organised. Also on this floor is the Leggate Lecture Theatre in which educational talks are given.
The top floor comprises the Tate Hall Museum which contains exhibits on a variety of subjects, including zoology
, medicine
, dentistry
, archaeology
, engineering
and oceanography
.
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...
, Merseyside
Merseyside
Merseyside is a metropolitan county in North West England, with a population of 1,365,900. It encompasses the metropolitan area centred on both banks of the lower reaches of the Mersey Estuary, and comprises five metropolitan boroughs: Knowsley, St Helens, Sefton, Wirral, and the city of Liverpool...
, England . It has been designated by English Heritage
English Heritage
English Heritage . is an executive non-departmental public body of the British Government sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport...
as a Grade II listed building. It was designed by Alfred Waterhouse
Alfred Waterhouse
Alfred Waterhouse was a British architect, particularly associated with the Victorian Gothic Revival architecture. He is perhaps best known for his design for the Natural History Museum in London, and Manchester Town Hall, although he also built a wide variety of other buildings throughout the...
and completed in 1892. It was the first purpose-built building for what was to become the University of Liverpool
University of Liverpool
The University of Liverpool is a teaching and research university in the city of Liverpool, England. It is a member of the Russell Group of large research-intensive universities and the N8 Group for research collaboration. Founded in 1881 , it is also one of the six original "red brick" civic...
, with accommodation for administration, teaching, common rooms and a library. The building was the inspiration for the term "red brick university"
Red Brick universities
Red brick university is an informal term used to refer to six particular universities founded in the major industrial cities of England. Five of the six red brick institutions gained university status before World War I and were initially established as civic science and/or engineering colleges...
which was coined by Professor Edgar Allison Peers
Edgar Allison Peers
Edgar Allison Peers , also known by his pseudonym Bruce Truscot, was an English Hispanist and educationist. He was Professor in Hispanic Studies at the University of Liverpool and is notable for founding the Modern Humanities Research Association and the Bulletin of Hispanic Studies .As "Bruce...
. In 2008 it was converted into a museum and gallery.
History
In 1882, University College, Liverpool, opened in a disused lunatic asylum and by 1887 it was decided that a purpose-built headquarters should be erected. Alfred WaterhouseAlfred Waterhouse
Alfred Waterhouse was a British architect, particularly associated with the Victorian Gothic Revival architecture. He is perhaps best known for his design for the Natural History Museum in London, and Manchester Town Hall, although he also built a wide variety of other buildings throughout the...
was appointed as architect and money was raised towards the construction. Much of this was raised by a public appeal and the private donors included Henry Tate
Henry Tate
Sir Henry Tate, 1st Baronet was an English sugar merchant and philanthropist, noted for establishing the Tate Gallery, London.-Life and career:...
, who gave £20,000 towards the building and a further £5,500 for books in the library, and William Hartley
Sir William Pickles Hartley
Sir William Pickles Hartley , jam manufacturer and philanthropist, founded the Hartley's jam company. He was born in Colne, Lancashire and attended a local British and Foreign School Society school.-Biography:...
, who paid £4,300 for the clock and bells in the tower. The builders were Brown and Backhouse and the brickwork was contracted to Joshua Henshaw and Sons. Victoria Building was officially opened in December 1892 by Lord Spencer, the Chancellor of the Victoria University
Victoria University (UK)
Victoria University was an English federal university established by Royal Charter, 20 April 1880 at Manchester: a university for the North of England open to affiliation by colleges such as Owens College which immediately did so. University College Liverpool joined the University in 1884, followed...
.
The building housed lecture rooms, staff offices, common rooms and, on the top floor, the Tate Library. As the university grew, departments gradually moved out of the building, which became increasingly used for administration. In 1938 the Harold Cohen Library
Harold Cohen Library
The Harold Cohen Library is the University of Liverpool's main library for science, engineering and medical, dental and veterinary sciences. It also contains eight computer centres as well as the Wolfson training suite....
opened and the contents of the library were moved out of the Victoria Building. The former library became the Tate Hall which was used for exhibitions, formal events and as an examination room. In 1970 the administration moved from the Victoria Building into the Senate House. In 2008, to coincide with Liverpool being European Capital of Culture
European Capital of Culture
The European Capital of Culture is a city designated by theEuropean Union for a period of one calendar year during which it organises a series of cultural events with a strong European dimension....
, the building was converted into the Victoria Gallery and Museum.
Architecture
Victoria Building is constructed in RuabonRuabon
Ruabon is a village and community in the county borough of Wrexham in Wales.More than 80% of the population of 2,400 were born in Wales with 13.6% speaking Welsh....
brick and common brick with terracotta dressings under a slate roof. It is an L-shaped building in three storeys with 13 bays facing Brownlow Hill and five bays in Ashton Street. The southerly eight bays have alternate gable
Gable
A gable is the generally triangular portion of a wall between the edges of a sloping roof. The shape of the gable and how it is detailed depends on the structural system being used and aesthetic concerns. Thus the type of roof enclosing the volume dictates the shape of the gable...
s and gabled dormer
Dormer
A dormer is a structural element of a building that protrudes from the plane of a sloping roof surface. Dormers are used, either in original construction or as later additions, to create usable space in the roof of a building by adding headroom and usually also by enabling addition of windows.Often...
s. The ninth bay forms the tower. It has an arched entrance over which is an oriel window
Oriel window
Oriel windows are a form of bay window commonly found in Gothic architecture, which project from the main wall of the building but do not reach to the ground. Corbels or brackets are often used to support this kind of window. They are seen in combination with the Tudor arch. This type of window was...
and, above this a three-light window. Over this are the royal coat of arms
Royal coat of arms of the United Kingdom
The Royal coat of arms of the United Kingdom is the official coat of arms of the British monarch, currently Queen Elizabeth II. These arms are used by the Queen in her official capacity as monarch of the United Kingdom, and are officially known as her Arms of Dominion...
, a mosaic
Mosaic
Mosaic is the art of creating images with an assemblage of small pieces of colored glass, stone, or other materials. It may be a technique of decorative art, an aspect of interior decoration, or of cultural and spiritual significance as in a cathedral...
panel with an inscription and machicolation
Machicolation
A machicolation is a floor opening between the supporting corbels of a battlement, through which stones, or other objects, could be dropped on attackers at the base of a defensive wall. The design was developed in the Middle Ages when the Norman crusaders returned. A machicolated battlement...
. The top stage has a four-face clock. At each angle of the tower are buttress
Buttress
A buttress is an architectural structure built against or projecting from a wall which serves to support or reinforce the wall...
es which rise to form pinnacle
Pinnacle
A pinnacle is an architectural ornament originally forming the cap or crown of a buttress or small turret, but afterwards used on parapets at the corners of towers and in many other situations. The pinnacle looks like a small spire...
s with lead spirelets. Over all is a lead spire with two tiers of lucarne
Lucarne
A lucarne is a small dormer window that is built on a spire or roof during the Gothic and Romanesque time period....
s. The tenth bay has staircase windows with a gable above. The end bays curve round behind an octagonal tower with a spire.
The building is fire-proof, and constructed around an iron frame, with concrete floors. Internally the entrance hall is faced in Burmantofts terracotta
Burmantofts Pottery
Burmantofts Pottery was the common trading name of a manufacturer of ceramic pipes and construction materials, named after the Burmantofts district of Leeds, England....
, which is mainly brown but with some blue. An arcaded
Arcade (architecture)
An arcade is a succession of arches, each counterthrusting the next, supported by columns or piers or a covered walk enclosed by a line of such arches on one or both sides. In warmer or wet climates, exterior arcades provide shelter for pedestrians....
staircase leads to the first floor which has a lecture theatre occupying the apse
Apse
In architecture, the apse is a semicircular recess covered with a hemispherical vault or semi-dome...
at the north end. The top floor consists of a large space which contained the previous library. In the entrance hall is a life-size marble
Marble
Marble is a metamorphic rock composed of recrystallized carbonate minerals, most commonly calcite or dolomite.Geologists use the term "marble" to refer to metamorphosed limestone; however stonemasons use the term more broadly to encompass unmetamorphosed limestone.Marble is commonly used for...
statue by Albert Bruce Joy, the University war memorial and on the stairs are memorial plaques. The clock in the tower was made by William Potts & Sons
Potts of Leeds
Potts of Leeds was a major British manufacturer of public clocks, based in Leeds, Yorkshire, UK.- Introduction :William Potts was born in December 1809 and was apprenticed to Samuel Thompson, a Darlington clockmaker. In 1833, at the age of 24, William moved to Pudsey near Leeds, to set up his own...
of Leeds
Leeds
Leeds is a city and metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England. In 2001 Leeds' main urban subdivision had a population of 443,247, while the entire city has a population of 798,800 , making it the 30th-most populous city in the European Union.Leeds is the cultural, financial and commercial...
. Also in the tower is a ring
Ring of bells
"Ring of bells" is a term most often applied to a set of bells hung in the English style, typically for change ringing...
of five bells cast by Taylors of Loughborough
Loughborough
Loughborough is a town within the Charnwood borough of Leicestershire, England. It is the seat of Charnwood Borough Council and is home to Loughborough University...
. Each bell is inscribed with a line from Tennyson
Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson
Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson, FRS was Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom during much of Queen Victoria's reign and remains one of the most popular poets in the English language....
's In Memoriam
In Memoriam A.H.H.
In Memoriam A.H.H. is a poem by the English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson, completed in 1849. It is a requiem for the poet's Cambridge friend Arthur Henry Hallam, who died suddenly of a cerebral haemorrhage in Vienna in 1833...
.
Victoria Gallery and Museum
The Victoria Gallery & Museum is open to the public from Tuesday to Saturday each week and admission is free. On the ground floor is the Waterhouse Café and a shop. On the first floor is the art collection which comprises paintings, sculptures and ceramics. Artists represented include Joseph Wright of DerbyJoseph Wright of Derby
Joseph Wright , styled Wright of Derby, was an English landscape and portrait painter. He has been acclaimed as "the first professional painter to express the spirit of the Industrial Revolution"....
, J. M. W. Turner
J. M. W. Turner
Joseph Mallord William Turner RA was an English Romantic landscape painter, watercolourist and printmaker. Turner was considered a controversial figure in his day, but is now regarded as the artist who elevated landscape painting to an eminence rivalling history painting...
, Jacob Epstein
Jacob Epstein
Sir Jacob Epstein KBE was an American-born British sculptor who helped pioneer modern sculpture. He was born in the United States, and moved to Europe in 1902, becoming a British citizen in 1911. He often produced controversial works which challenged taboos on what was appropriate subject matter...
, Lucian Freud
Lucian Freud
Lucian Michael Freud, OM, CH was a British painter. Known chiefly for his thickly impasted portrait and figure paintings, he was widely considered the pre-eminent British artist of his time...
, Elizabeth Frink and John James Audubon
John James Audubon
John James Audubon was a French-American ornithologist, naturalist, and painter. He was notable for his expansive studies to document all types of American birds and for his detailed illustrations that depicted the birds in their natural habitats...
. A series of special exhibitions is organised. Also on this floor is the Leggate Lecture Theatre in which educational talks are given.
The top floor comprises the Tate Hall Museum which contains exhibits on a variety of subjects, including zoology
Zoology
Zoology |zoölogy]]), is the branch of biology that relates to the animal kingdom, including the structure, embryology, evolution, classification, habits, and distribution of all animals, both living and extinct...
, medicine
Medicine
Medicine is the science and art of healing. It encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness....
, dentistry
Dentistry
Dentistry is the branch of medicine that is involved in the study, diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of diseases, disorders and conditions of the oral cavity, maxillofacial area and the adjacent and associated structures and their impact on the human body. Dentistry is widely considered...
, archaeology
Archaeology
Archaeology, or archeology , is the study of human society, primarily through the recovery and analysis of the material culture and environmental data that they have left behind, which includes artifacts, architecture, biofacts and cultural landscapes...
, engineering
Engineering
Engineering is the discipline, art, skill and profession of acquiring and applying scientific, mathematical, economic, social, and practical knowledge, in order to design and build structures, machines, devices, systems, materials and processes that safely realize improvements to the lives of...
and oceanography
Oceanography
Oceanography , also called oceanology or marine science, is the branch of Earth science that studies the ocean...
.