A Further Look at Leeds Central Library

 

A depiction of the tax collector carved in Caen stone

When photographing the listed buildings on Great George Street, I took a short diversion to Leeds Central Library, by George Corson, which I had visited in the summer of 2018 and had later written Language of Stone Blog posts that briefly described the exterior, the marbles and granites and the limestones used in its interior. 

 

The railings on the Calverley Street elevation

 

I had also provided photographs for the British Listed Buildings website and I had no reason to visit it again, except to have another quick look at the owls on the cast iron railings, the various decorative stones used for the doorway and vestibule on Calverley Street and the fine Caen stone carving in the entrance hall. 

 

A detail of the Shap light granite 

 

Although the Building Stone Heritage of Leeds (BSHL) mentions the sandstone used for the exterior, Shap light granite with orthoclase feldspar phenocrysts for the steps, Peterhead and Rubislaw granites used for the columns and the Caen stone, it surprisingly doesn’t make any attempt to identify the Devonshire marbles in the vestibule, which are actually polished limestones and not true marbles. 

 

A Devonshire marble column

 

Decorative Stone The Complete Sourcebook by Monica Price includes only Ashburton marble from Devonshire, which I am quite familiar with from its use in Sheffield Central Library and Sheffield City Hall, but I might need to purchase the books by Gordon Walkden, if these are still available, before I could throw further light on these. 

 

Devonshire Marbles by Gordon Walkden

 

The BSHL also doesn't mention the very dark alabaster that has been used for panels and the elaborate screen that decorate the doorway from the vestibule to the entrance hall, which Susan Wrathmell in the Leeds Pevsner Architectural Guide says is by Farmer and Brindley from London, who were responsible for the sculpture on the Natural History Museum. 

 

An alabaster panel

The Caen stone, which King William I first brought to Britain after the Norman Conquest and was used for the White Tower at the Tower of London, Canterbury Cathedral and Rochester Cathedral, is very suited to fine carving and all the work seen is by John Wormald Appleyard. 

 

Carved Caen stone above the entrance to the lending library

 

I didn't have time to have another good look at the magnificent staircase, where various animals, including dogs and a lion, and grotesques adorn the handrails, which are made out of Hopton Wood limestone from Derbyshire. 

 

A detail of gryphons carved in Caen stone

 

The Caen stone capitals to the Peterhead and Rubislaw granite columns, gryphons and a roundel depicting a collector to the screen above the entrance to the lending library, which was formerly the pay office, are nevertheless fine examples of Wormald's carving.

 

A capital carved in Caen stone

 

At the Church of St. John the Baptist (1888) at Ranmoor in Sheffield, the canopy to the reredos provides an excellent example of carving in Caen stone by the eminent sculptor Frank Tory and St. Peter's church (1863-1870) in Birstall has a very ornate Caen stone pulpit. I have also seen a much simpler pulpit at St. Mary's church (1869) at Walkley in Sheffield, which seems to indicate that this stone was a very popular material with Victorian architects.

 

Pink Peterhead and grey Rubislaw granites

 

Great George Street in Leeds

 

A statue at the former Leeds School Board offices

 

Having photographed Oxford Chambers, Nos. 1, 2 and 3 Oxford Place and Britannia Buildings, next on my British Listed Buildings Photo Challenge were a mid C19 bollard on the corner next to No. 31 Great George Street, a pair of red brick built C19 shops and Nos. 33-33A and Nos. 35-41 - all of which have very little of interest to this Language of Stone Blog. 

 

A bollard and mid C19 listed brick buildings on Graet George Street

 

Retracing my steps along Great George Street, I stopped very briefly to photograph the ram’s head on a keystone at the rear of Leeds Town Hall (1858) before arriving at the corner of Calverley Street, where I intended to have another quick look at Leeds Central Library, which I had first visited in August 2018. 

 

The ram's head keystone at the rear of Leeds Town Hall

Before turning down Calverley Street to the library, which I will further describe in my next post, the imposing Grade II* listed Palladian Revival style Civic Court (1879-81) caught my eye. This is another building by the Scottish architect George Corson, whose work on Wellington Street and Hepper House on East Parade I had encountered earlier on my walk 

 

The former Leeds School Board offices

As in Sheffield, the Leeds School Board was set up shortly after the introduction of W.E. Forster’s Elementary Education Act of 1870 and this was originally built as its offices, with the Historic England (HE) description mentioning that they contained board and committee rooms on the ground floor, together with offices for clerks and attendant officers. 

 

The entrance to the former Leeds School Board offices

 

The architect Richard Adams was the board architect from 1873 until 1879, when other architects were commissioned to undertake their work, including George Corson who, like Charles John Innocent in Sheffield, was criticised for the extravagance of his design. 

 

The Leeds coat of arms and inscription in raised lettering

At high level, the words: 'LEEDS SCHOOL BOARD' are carved in relief beneath the Leeds coat of arms, which features and owl and on each side of the central entrance there are half size statues of a schoolgirl and schoolboy, by Matthew Taylor of Leeds. 

 

A statue at the former Leeds School Board offices

 

I didn’t look closely at the sandstone but the Building Stone Heritage of Leeds (BSHL) refer to Building News (1881, p.459), which states that Burley-in-Wharfedale stone from the Addingham Edge Grit has been used for the rusticated basement, with Pool Bank stone from the Caley Crags Grit for the superstructure above – although the Building Stones Database of England map explorer show the Pool Bank Quarries as being located on the Addingham Edge Grit. 

 

The Pool Bank Quarries on the Addingham Edge Grit

 

A couple of years earlier, I had seen the Addingham Edge Grit when walking along the lower footpath at Otley Chevin during a Sheffield U3A Geology Group field trip, where the crags and old quarry faces are heavily iron stained. The British Geological Survey describes it as varying from fine to very coarse grained, with sporadic pebbles, but I have never seen it used as a building stone and will make a point of looking at the building again when I next visit this part of Leeds. 

 

Nos. 6 to 14 Great George Street

Continuing up Great George Street, I just took a single photo of Nos. 6 to 14 (1848) built for J.F. Clark, who was a coach builder. The rusticated ground floor and the dressings are built with a uniformly buff coloured sandstone, but I didn’t investigate this any further and carried on to the Leonardo Building (c.1900). 

 

The Leonardo Building

 

This was built as the offices of Chorley and Pickersgill, a firm of printers that operated from the Electric Press Building (c.1900) on the opposite corner. Again, I just took a single photo of this building and didn’t look at the sandstone used for the entrance on the splay and for the dressings on the floors above. The adjoining Thoresby Building (1900), which was built for the Pupil Teachers' College by Walter Samuel Braithwaite, is another large brick building with sandstone dressings that I just viewed from a distance. 

 

The Thoresby Building

 

On the opposite side of the road is Cathedral House, the presbytery to St. Anne’s Roman Catholic Cathedral, which was not part of my Photo Challenge, but I was quite interested in the design of the building, which is described by HE as the Arts and Craft Gothic Revival style. 

 

Cathedral House

The bricks and stonework were quite dirty and I didn’t take much notice of them, but the BSHL notes that sand faced Suffolk white bricks are used here, which I can’t recall seeing since I have lived in South Yorkshire, with the Ketton stone - an oolitic limestone from near Stamford - used for the door surround and dressings. 

Cathedral House

Next to this is Cathedral Chambers (1900) by John Mitchell Bottomley, which was built as a masonic hall but has since been converted into offices. The ground floor is built with a brown glazed brick plinth, red brick for the ground floor and pinkish coloured brick for the first floor – another material that is unusual in the region. 

 

Cathedral Chambers

The BSHL refer to the Building News (1900, p.73), which describes the extensive use of red Corncockle stone from Dumfries and Galloway in Scotland for the door surround and window dressings, which are all slightly blackened. 

 

The front elevation of Cathedral Chambers

 

Although I had obtained a sample of this Permian sandstone for the Triton Stone Library, which is now housed in the Redmires Building at Sheffield Hallam University and has an accompanying website, I have never seen this bright red sandstone used in a building. Crossing over to have a better look at the sandstone, I was interested to see that the foundation stone is made of Devonian Shap dark granite, which has large rectangular pink orthoclase feldspar phenocrysts. 

 

The foundation stone of Cathedral Chambers

The last building to photograph on Great George Street was the former City of Leeds School (1889) by Kelly and Birchall, which is one of several large brick buildings in this part of Leeds that were used for education and I only viewed it from a distance to take a few general photos. I didn't get close enough to examine the sandstone dressings, but the BSHL identify it as coarse grained Rough Rock that is only suitable for bold carving.

 

The former City of Leeds School

The Headrow and Oxford Place in Leeds

 

Capitals and granite columns at the entrance to Britannia Buildings

Continuing my British Listed Buildings Photo Challenge in the western part of Leeds City Centre Conservation Area, I went to explore the area between The Headrow and Great George Street – a part of Leeds that I never had reason to visit before but which the Building Stone Heritage of Leeds (BSHL) includes in Walk 1. 

 

Walk 1 in the Building Stone Heritage of Leeds

 

Turning left into The Headrow, having photographed buildings on East Parade and Park Row, the first building on my list, Athenaeum House (c.1890), was completely shrouded by scaffolding and debris netting and although the Jubilee Hotel (1904) was also scaffolded, a section of brick red terracotta was revealed on the Park Cross Street elevation. 

 

Leeds Town Hall

 

On the north side of the Headrow is Leeds Town Hall (1858), where I wanted to have another look at its stonework and photograph the Grade II listed forecourt wall, but a hoarding had been erected and I later discovered that an ongoing £18 million renovation was being undertaken. 

 

Oxford Place Methodist Church and Oxford Chambers

 

The corner of Westgate and Oxford Place is occupied by the Oxford Place Methodist Church (1835), which was remodelled 1896-1903 by G.F. Danby and W.H. Thorp in the Renaissance Revival style, with the addition of Oxford Chambers (c.1900). The Builder (1904, p.637) names the sandstone used for the dressings as Thornhill Rock from the Morley Moor quarries

 

The entrance to Oxford Place Methodist Church

 

Oxford Chambers is connected to the main façade of the church by a curved wall and its tower is surmounted with a cupola. This sandstone has been used for the ashlar at Morley Town Hall and for many substantial nonconformist chapels in Morley, but I didn't closely examine the stone used here and quickly moved on to photograph Nos. 1, 2 and 3 Oxford Place. 

 

Oxford Chambers

 

The Gothic Revival style Britannia Buildings (1868), which was not part of my Photo Challenge, is built in red brick with sandstone dressings and the HE description states that it was probably designed by Charles Fowler, an engineer and surveyor who was also well known for producing a map of Leeds in 1819, and that it was the first purpose built block of office chambers in the city. 

 

Britannia Buildings

 

It has some fine raised lettering and architectural sculpture to the door surround, Corinthian capitals and quatrefoils on the panels below the ground floor windows, but I didn't closely examine the uniformly coloured medium grained sandstone. 

 

The door surround at Britannia Buildings

 

As seen at Hepper House on East Parade, where the granite used for the porch has been considered by the BSHL to have been the first use in Leeds, the columns to the doorway and the ground floor windows are made with pink Peterhead granite.

 

A detail of the door surround at Britannia Buildings

East Parade and Park Row in Leeds

 

The frieze sculpture above the south entrance to Abtech House

Continuing my British Listed Buildings Photo Challenge for the west part of the Leeds City Centre Conservation Area, at the end of St. Paul’s Street I turned left onto East Parade, a street that was laid out between 1779 and 1789 but now consists only of C19 and C20 buildings. 

 

No. 9 East Parade

 

The Grade II Listed No. 9 East Parade  is designed in an Italianate style and built with sandstone ashlar that has a yellowish colour, which immediately made me think that this could be an example of the massive variety of the Elland Flags, a Pennine Lower Coal Measures Formation sandstone that was very widely used in Leeds. 

 

No. 7 East Parade on the 1891 OS map

It is dated by Historic England (HE) as c.1870 but at parapet level, beneath the statue of Britannia and a lion, there is a panel with the lettering Established 1840 and looking at the 1850 and 1891 editions of the 1:500 scale Ordnance Survey (OS) maps, there seems to have been no change to the plan of the building, which would suggest that rebuilding may had taken place.

 

East Parade Chambers

The adjoining East Parade Chambers (1899), which I had photographed along with No. 9 and No. 17A when preparing the Sheffield U3A Geology Group field trip to Leeds in 2019, are offices built with Burmantofts faience tiles in the Free Renaissance style. 

 

No. 17A East Parade

No. 17A (1865), also known as Hepper House, was the auction house, with offices and a saleroom that was designed in a Venetian Gothic style for Hepper and Sons by George Corson, whose textile warehouses I had seen on Wellington Street. 

 

The entrance to the porch

  

This is included in Walk 3 in the Building Stones Heritage of Leeds (BSHL), which describes that it is built with Elland Flags sandstone from the Harehills Quarry - as recorded in The Builder (1863, p.424) – and is considered to be one of the last examples of locally quarried sandstones, before the railways brought in building stone from further afield. 

 

Capitals to the granite columns in the porch

 

To the first floor windows, red sandstone voussoirs, which is probably Red Mansfield, alternate with the Carboniferous sandstone and this can be seen in the arch to the porch and associated band courses. The pink Peterhead granite columns to the porch, which have lost their polish - perhaps due to inappropriate cleaning with hydrofluoric acid – are the first recorded use of granite in Leeds. 

 

Capitals to the granite columns in the porch

The intricate stone carvings on the arch to the porch, which include acanthus leaves and other floral patterns, are of the highest quality and still retain very sharp profiles but HE doesn’t make any reference to these fine details. 

 

Acanthus leaves and detailed stone carving

 

Crossing over the road to the look at the plinth of office block occupied by SCP, on the corner with South Parade, I was interested to see the rapakivi granite from Finland known as Baltic Brown, which I had previously seen on St. Paul’s Street. 

 

Baltic Brown granite

It is found in South Karelia near to the Russian border and formed approximately 1.6 billion years ago in the Mesoproterozoic era. It is characterised by large approximately spherical pink orthoclase feldspar phenocrysts with a mantle of greenish oligoclase feldspar, which form concentric rings and are the result of a slow cooling process. 

 

Pearl Chambers

On the opposite corner is Pearl Chambers (1911), designed by the architect William Bakewell in the Free Gothic Revival style for the Pearl Assurance Company. I just took a couple of general photos, but the BSHL describes it as being one of the first major buildings in Leeds to use Portland stone and that Rubislaw granite from Aberdeen is used for the first floor. 

 

Abtech House

 

Retracing my steps along East Parade to Greek Street, which is excluded from the Conservation Area, the late Georgian No. 7 is rendered and painted and has no interest to this Language of Stone Blog and I continued to Park Row, which is at the heart of the financial didtrict. I had previously photographed several Grade II listed banks, but I wanted to have another look at Abtech House (1900), which was designed by Edward J. Dodgshun in the Baroque Revival style for the West Riding Union Bank. 

 

The relief sculpture by Joseph Thewlis

 

The frieze by Joseph Thewlis, who also worked on Kirkgate market, is the finest example of architectural sculpture that I have seen in Leeds and depicts Minerva sitting on an Art Nouveau throne, which is flanked by figures representing shipping interests in Africa and investment in the American railways. 

 

The relief sculpture above the north entrance

Above the entrances, according to the Pevsner Architectural Guide to Leeds by Susan Wrathmell,  'trade' and 'commerce' are personified by male and female figures representing peace and justice and purity and plenty. 

 

The Pevsner architectural guide for Leeds

The BSHL describes the medium grained sandstone as being Crosland Hill stone from the Rough Rock in Huddersfield, with a deep red Swedish granite that has purplish opalescence in the quartz grains used for the ground floor and the Emerald Pearl variety of Norwegian larvikite for the plinth.

 

Swedish red granite and Norwegian larvikite