The Lydgate Lane Council School

 

A virtue above the entrance for boys at Lydgate Lane Council School

Making my way along Lydgate Lane, having had a very quick look at a few historic buildings in Crosspool, the road rises up to a ridge of the Upper Carboniferous Rough Rock, which forms a local high point where there were once two substantial quarries, but is now dominated by the Tapton Hill radio transmitting station.

 

A general view

Before long, the former Lydgate Lane Council School loomed into view but, like all of the other Sheffield Board Schools that are still used as a school, there is no public access to the main south-west double gabled elevation and I had to take a few general photographs from a distance.

 

A general view

The school was built in 1907 with an Arts and Crafts style design by WJ Hale, who was also responsible for the Bolehill and Hammerton schools in Walkley and Darnall respectively. Although the masonry is slightly dirty, I think that it provides yet another example of the use of Crawshaw Sandstone from Bolehills in Crookes, with Stoke Hall stone from Derbyshire for the dressings.

 

Carved virtues above the entrance for infants

As with the Hammerton School, the Victorian Society book Building Schools for Sheffield  says that Hale made liberal use of elaborately carved ‘virtues’ on the capstones to the tall pilasters on the principal elevation, but I could not see these or the datestone; however, I could see Duty and Order carved above the entrance for infants.

 

Inscribed gate piers

Walking up the hill alongside the boundary wall, there are gate piers that mark the separate entrances for infants, girls and boys and are made of the usual medium to coarse grained gritstone and, at the northern end of the site, is the caretaker’s house.

 

The caretaker's house

 

Surprisingly, the gates to the entrance at the caretaker’s house were open and I therefore took advantage of this to take a good look at the entrance for boys on the north-east elevation, which mirrored the one for the infants on the south-west side and has more virtues - Honour and Courage.

 

A virtue carved above the entrance for boys

Taking advantage of the open gates, I had a very quick wander around the rear yard to take a couple of photos of the blackened rear elevation to the school, which is much more simple in style than the front elevation.

 

The rear elevation

 

At high level on the capping to the pilasters, there are further examples of virtues – Chivalry, Justice, Courtesy and Reverence – which are discernable through the dirt from ground level. Apart from small modern extensions, although the structure is largely unaltered, the building has not been considered worthy of listing.

 

Virtues on the rear elevation