In 1956, with University considering plans for expansion, Alan Bullock obtained approval to transform St Catherine’s Society into a fully residential college – the search for a site and funding began.
An ambitious fundraising campaign began, focusing on the national shortage of scientists and on Bullock’s proposal of an increased number of science students at St Catherine’s than was usual for an Oxford college. In 1960 almost eight acres of Holywell Great Meadow was acquired from Merton College and the College’s chosen architect, Arne Jacobsen of Denmark, began to implement his design. His modernist masterpiece was to become the most important 20th-century collegiate buildings in Oxford, and is now Grade I listed.
In 1962 St Catherine’s College opened its doors – while still under construction, with Alan Bullock as its Master. The first undergraduates were admitted, and were quickly dubbed the ‘Dirty Thirty’ owing to the lack of running hot water. 1964 saw the ceremonial opening of the College by the then Chancellor of the University, Harold Macmillan, and ten years later in 1974, staying true to its forward-looking ethos, it became one of the first colleges to admit women.
As a footnote – it’s possibly not a great idea to rush around an unfamiliar city trying to snap as much as possible on a very hot day time limited by budget train bookings largely underfed and thirsty.
St Catherine’s College: 1961-66. Arne Jacobsen – Grade I Listed
Podium and all buildings upon it. GV I College buildings, raised on a podium, including dining hall, common room blocks; two residential blocks; library; Bernard Sunley Lecture Theatre; bell tower; piers and covering to walkways to east and west of library and east and west of hall; bridge adjoining west side of podium; brick walls enclosing canal and patio areas on western edge of podium; brick walls to patio areas to eastern edge of podium; twenty five short stretches of garden wall all running east-west, some incorporating seats; paving to podium surface and steps to east and south sides.
Designed by James Stirling and Partners in 1966-1967 for Queen’s College, Oxford, and built 1968-1971, with Roy Cameron as associate, and Frank Newby of F J Samuely and Partners as engineer.
RIBA pix 2005 Jeremy Harrison
Listed at Grade II* for the following principal reasons:
* as a highly significant work by Sir James Stirling, one of Britain’s foremost post-war architects;
* as the last of a triumvirate of university buildings that are without doubt amongst Stirling’s most significant works in England;
* as a highly creative re-working of a familiar formal language, executed with masterful handling of form and colour, characteristic of Stirling’s style;
* for the high degree of survival of the original plan form, fixtures and fittings, which have been little altered since the building’s completion, including but not limited to the bedrooms, porter’s lodge, and breakfast room;
* as a distinctive and popular piece of post-war university architecture.
On the day of my visit the building was secured and in a state of semi-dereliction, mothballed by the owners TheQueens College Oxford.
There have been plans and a competition for refurbishment:
Perhaps the most charismatic of James Stirling’s surviving buildings; the Florey Building is hugely admired worldwide for its boldness and heroism.
Despite some practical and infamous failings, the Florey has a cult presence in Oxford: a modernist’s riposte to a city defined by traditional architectural masterworks.
The Queen’s College Fellows seek a dedicated team who are inspired by Stirling’s exhilarating vision. The challenge: to use advances in technology to update the building, provide modern facilities and achieve exemplary energy design.
The competition has now concluded — 27th February 2014
The Queen’s College, Oxford is delighted to announce that the team led by Avanti Architects has won the design competition to update the Grade II listed Florey building, widely regarded as an emblem of modernism. Avanti will now work to develop their scheme for the project and determine construction priorities.
The plans however were poorly received:
Alas the proposal for Florey lets down the practice, the college and most importantly Jim Stirling and the Modernist corpus, with a design that all but wrecks the essence of this unique building.
Alan Berman – founding partner at Berman Guedes Stretton
These proposals must be thrown out and consigned with distaste to the dustbin as a gross violation of Stirling’s intentions.
If permitted, they would constitute the comprehensive betrayal, by alteration, of one of the internationally most important buildings of the 20th century.
Thomas Muirhead – Stirling’s friend and former colleague.
Furthermore there has been a history of criticism of the building:
At the official opening in 1971, the Queen Mother was rumoured to have said it was the ugliest building she had ever seen.
College bursar AA Williams described it as – a structure revolting and inhuman in its hideousness and defective in practically every aspect of its functioning.
Just a year later, students were complaining that it leaked, was noisy, too hot in summer, too cold in winter, they couldn’t stand up straight in the showers, and there were no baths.
Lord Florey, the pioneer of penicillin after whom the building is named put up the money, and was almost the architect’s sole supporter in the college.
This culminated in a legal battle, an intense dislike of the building throughout the college, a reluctance to spend anything but the minimum on maintenance, and decades later, to the possibility of demolition.
Oxford Mail.
So with little institutional love and a soupçon of general loathing, we are left with a Listed building in limbo.
Happily Leicester University are taking care to care for their Stirling building.
The current railway station is a modern version from the 1980s that was built on top of the original station – it is entirely functional, but more than somewhat undistinguished.
Whether it’s fashion, gifts, everyday essentials or an entertaining day out that you’re after, Market Walk has it all. With over thirty shops along an outdoor parade, plus entertainment and hospitality venues, there’s something for everyone.
AEW Architects were appointed by Chorley Council in 2015 as Architects for the Market Walk Scheme.
The Council’s aspiration was to breathe life back into the town centre by enhancing Chorley’s retail and leisure offer and refocusing Chorley’s centre as a destination for local residents and surrounding towns. The development needed to entice new, and retain existing, businesses in the town. Aesthetically, the development also needed to be a landmark for, and create a modern gateway into, the town – driving footfall towards Chorley’s commercial centre.
Next door is the Bus Station, opened in February 2003 replacing the previous structure.
Opening of the previous Bus Station – Ribble the area’s operators, before the Stagecoach arrived.
Opened on on 3rd September 1910, one of the nation’s longest continuously running cinemas.
I spent some time chatting to the chatty guardian of the booking office, I learnt that the recently installed blue plaque commemorates the areas links to esteemed Beano artist Leo Baxendale.
Leo attended St Mary’s School which was sited opposite the theatre, he had a miserable time there, an experience which formed the basis for the famed Bash Street Kids.
He may well now chuckle to himself in comic book heaven, knowing that the school was demolished in 1982.
The design team was Roger Booth, Lancashire County Architect; CA Spivey, Assistant County Architect; DB Stephenson, Design Architect; and DG Edwards, AG Gass, responsible for the detailed design and construction. The seven-storey in-situ concrete framed main block was the last bespoke police station to be built in Lancashire, following this the department developed a systemised concrete construction method which was deployed across the county. The dramatic cantilevers gave the new building a stature and presence that signalled authority. The lower levels were accessed by ramps and provided space for police vehicles. To enter the police station one ascended a set of external stairs across a pool that once contained koi carp – fittingly, one boy described the new building as a ‘fishtank’ upon its completion. The magistrates’ court was finished externally in a grey brick and carried the signature pyramid rooflights that were synonymous with the Department.
Next door its partner in crime the Magistrates Courts.
Opened in 1968.
The courts are up for sale – offers in the region of £800,000 – the property has planning permission for an eleven storey apartment building with fifty two flats, three ground floor retail units and roof terrace.
The disused court building was last sold in 2022 for £300,000, according to the Land Registry.
Designs for the scheme were drawn up by FWP Group.
Next door is a pub no longer a pub.
Once upon a time a Vaux Brewery house the White Hart – implausibly renamed the Snooty Fox for a brief period.
The pub was decent enough inside with a large room which was empty on our Friday dinner visit, the pub was a Vaux tied house so we were well pleased as we had not done many of them.
We had a drink of Vaux bitter which went down well.
Our group was created in February 2022 to try and help raise awareness of the crisis in Ukraine and to help organise and coordinate local efforts to send support from across the Borough of Chorley in Lancashire. We have since grown into a major hub for donations.
Across Chorley & District multiple educational facilities, community groups and organisations reacted and began to spread awareness and collect donations. In order to sift and sort a lot of local donations, a unit has been loaned by Chorley Council. A large percentage of the region’s aid has come into this unit and we are regularly packaging aid and supplies in preparation for the next leg of the journey to Ukraine, whether it’s transported there by us or other charitable organisations.
Our philosophy is that if we can all do a little bit, together we can make a big difference.
Bouncing back to what was and never shall be no more Barclays Bank.
Almost finally we find ourselves at the Council Offices 1982.
You will be delighted to hear that Chorley Council has a Masterplan
Self Architects generated a high level Masterplan for this prominent site. The scheme proposes a boutique hotel, offices, restaurants/bars, along with apartments, aiming to transform the town centre by intervention to enhance the overall vision by:
Establish a series of formal/informal public spaces
Diagonally link public spaces
Greening pedestrian streets
Reducing dominance of cars
Improving evening economy
Having a moment or two on my hands I ventured to the land beyond beyond – the land of the concrete bench, bin and planter combo.
Seen here in 2011 via Google – with clear windows and delightful signage.
2024 with vinyl covered windows and sign intact.
By the time of my visit in May 2026 – the sign and the Bentley were no more.
This is my most recent wander into a washateria following something of a lay off. Having previously published a launderette book and calendar way back when.
So once again we enter that familiar bubble of bubbles, whirrs and washing.
Nevern is a rural village in Pembrokeshire, West Wales.
The surrounding land is devoted largely to agriculture.
The church was founded by St Brynach in 540AD and the present building dates from around 1400.
Tim Rushton and I were cycling from Fishguard to Aberteifi on the Route 82 Lôn Teifi, which passes through Nevern.
So we stopped to have a look around.
1955
The most probable reason Brynach chose Nevern was the protection afforded it by its obscurity and the Castle above the village which had been a fortified stronghold since Iron-age times. He was a kinsman of the Goedelic Tribal Chieftains who occupied it.
Though the Peregrinatio had learned their theology and scholarship by travelling to monasteries on the Continent under the rule of Rome, the Celtic Church was very different. The ‘churches’ were in essence small monasteries or ‘clas’ peopled by monks. They had a leader or Abbot such as Brynach but were centres of learning and small-scale industry as much as for worship.
Evangelising by monks took place from the ‘mother churches’, so when a church is said to have been founded by a certain saint it was probably named after the leader of the ‘clas’. The life of the ‘clas’ and its form of worship, essentially different to that of Rome, changed very little from its formation in the 6thC into the century after the Norman Conquest, except that in the C8th repeated persuasion by the Continental conquerors of middle Britain converted the Celtic Church to Catholicism, henceforth adopting its dates and some of its rites.
The Vikings sacked St. David’s in 878, killing the bishop, and were a constant scourge along the coast for the next three hundred years. This is where the Castle played its most important role in the life of the church. They built a tower stronghold on a spit of land separated from the main castle where they would ‘sit out’ the Viking raids literally burning their bridge behind them. Fortunately for them the Vikings had a short attention span and were loath to lay siege preferring to push on to other targets, so, apart from having to occasionally rebuild their church, the Christians at Nevern were left relatively unharmed.
Having landed in the country in 1066 the Normans arrived at Nevern in the latter years of the 11th Century. They usurped the local chieftains from the Castle – though their descendants still live in the parish to this day and rebuilt the Castle in their usual Motte and Bailey manner. They evidently intended to make Nevern their manor in this area, which accounts for an unusually large church in a small village, but changed their minds moving to Newport, building a much larger castle, and populating the town with their loyal English supporters.
The church as it presently stands was built in this period, the oldest part being the Tower dating from about 1380 and the nave and Chancel following 1420-1450, built in the ‘Late Perpendicular’ style learned from the Normans. indeed, quite possibly supervised by French overseers. The church obviously held some status before this, because in 1291 Archbishop Baldwin and Giraldus Cambrensis came through raising money for Pope Nicholas IV’s 3rd Crusade, Nevern’s annual value was £16, more than double any other church in the Deanery.
The church as it stands today has a Norman tower and Tudor nave, but it was rigorously restored in 1864.
Legends abound here: one of the yew trees is called the Bleeding Yew, and has dark blood like sap that oozes year round. And the first cuckoo of Spring is supposed to sing from Nevern Cross on 7 April, St Brynach’s Day.
Tim Rushton and m’self were cycling from Fishguard to Aberystwyth, as we have in previous years, taking the train from Stockport and setting off on our way through Pembrokeshire and beyond. Modern pilgrims crossing the ancient pilgrim’s route.
This was the second day of our tour, from Aberteifi to Lllandysul.
At the end of a long lane that follows the Afon Teifi we saw this low stone church, tucked beneath the rising landscape to the right.
We both share a love of architecture and vernacular churches in particular – Tim, illustrated below, has produced a book on Welsh Chapels.
So we stopped to take a look around.
Old St David’s lies on the pilgrimage route to the cathedral of the same dedication and next to the Teifi River. Frequent flooding led to a new church being built on the other side of the river in the 19th century. It also explains why the church has its own coracle, which once ferried worshippers to and fro during a flood. Unfortunately, the church is still prone to flooding, most recently in September 2021.
This is a reproduction as the original was stolen.
The church you see today is a 13th-century building, remodelled in 1847 to the elegant Georgian Gothick interior. This style was already out of fashion in more urban parts and by 1899, the church had fallen out of regular use.
The nave walls are lined with a set of 18th-century box-pews; some have fluted columns, drawers with brass handles, and some even have their own fireplaces.
The square font, which you’ll find right inside the west porch, dates to the 13th century and is the only survivor from the early church. Its underside is fluted and its sides are carved with quatrefoils.
Don’t miss the memorial to Capt. Charles Colby, who was stationed to Rawalpindi – now in Pakistan in about 1850. On a day off, he went hunting on an elephant, and was unfortunately mauled by a tiger. His plaque bears an urn with the inscription ‘Rawil Pinde’ and a carved palm tree.
Many thanks to the Friends of Friendless churches for ensuring that the church remains open and maintained.
As a postscript – the appreciation of these wonderful Welsh churches must be due in part to John Piper.
Jerwood Foundation was recently alerted to a renewed recognition of John Piper’s painting The churchyard, in Jerwood Collection, after it appeared as an illustration accompanying an online article. The image was immediately recognised by a reader as depicting St Baglan’s Church, near Caernarfon, viewed from a familiar angle.
John Piper, a founding member of Friends of Friendless Churches in the 1950s, painted many historic churches across the UK. Although St Baglan’s has been under the charity’s care since the 1970s, this rediscovery offers a valuable insight into Piper’s early engagement with sites that would later become key rescue projects. The recognition helps to piece together the history of how some of the charity’s earliest churches were identified, recorded and preserved.
Following my previous visits to the University of York, recording the history and the Fred Millett Reliefs, I have searched the RIBA pix archives to find further images.
They mainly illustrate the Derwent and Langwith Colleges – both built using the CLASP system of construction.
The University of York was founded in 1963 and work on its campus facilities in the grounds of Heslington Hall was begun in 1964. The first two colleges, Langwith and Derwent, accepted residential students for the autumn term of 1965. The original buildings were designed by Sir Andrew Derbyshire of Robert Matthew Johnson-Marshall & Partners, and assembled using the CLASP system of prefabricated construction.
Derwent College: one of the two covered walkways linking the college buildings with sculptural relief by Fred Millett at the far end.
Photographs 1965 – Reginald Hugo de Burgh Galwey.
Derwent College: a concrete panel sculptured by Fred Millett.
Derwent College.
Photographs 1965 Keith Gibson.
JB Morrell Library.
Derwent College: a covered walkway over the lake.
Central Hall.
Photograph 1972 Bill Toomey.
Vanbrugh College: stepped roof to the covered way leading down to the lake.
Photograph 1972 Peter Bairstow.
Derwent College and Heslington Hall.
Photographs 1965 – Reginald Hugo de Burgh Galwey.
Langwith College, seen from the lake.
Langwith College.
Photographs 1965 Bill Toomey.
David Brown Laboratories: the flue stack.
David Brown laboratories: the water tower.
Photographs 1965 – Reginald Hugo de Burgh Galwey.
Derwent College.
Derwent College.
Langwith College: close-up of the oriel windows.
Photographs 1965 Bill Toomey.
Derwent College: a concrete sculptured screen flanking a covered way.
Derwent College: a concrete sculptured screen flanking a covered way.
One of several concrete link bridges.
Another of the several concrete link bridges.
Photographs 1965 – Reginald Hugo de Burgh Galwey.
David Brown laboratories: seen from one of the link bridges.
David Brown Laboratories: the flue stack and water tower rising above the laboratory blocks.
J. B. Morrell Library: the central staircase and lift tower.
Photographs 1965 Keith Gibson.
Central Hall.
JB Morrell Library, University of York, seen from the south side of Heslington Road with linking pedestrian bridge and ramp in foreground and cast aluminium sculpture by Austin Wright
JB Morrell Library: the covered pedestrian bridge linking the library to the southern side of the campus.
JB Morrell Library.
JB Morrell Library: the main entrance and terrace.
JB Morrell Library: the issue counter seen from the second floor.
JB Morrell Library: viewpoint from the fourth floor.
The covered pedestrian bridge linking the southern side of the campus to the JB Morrell Library on the north side.
The chapel was closed on a Saturday so we wandered around outside, peering curiously through the windows. Surrounded by mature planting, the bare brick and glazing is more than somewhat softened, the planting however does inhibit the intrepid photographer.
Designed 1965, built 1966-7; architect George Gaze Pace, executant assistant Ronald Sims.
Reinforced concrete frame, partly left exposed, clad in pale brick. Monopitched roofs. Low flat roofs to entrances and between the three main elements with thick board-marked eaves. Central space flanked by angled transepts, with organ loft to (liturgical) west end and wing of offices behind. Long narrow flat-headed windows between brick mullions, timber doors. Attached walls and steel gate lead to inner garden, intended for contemplation.
Interior with exposed concrete frame, including piers and thick ring beam at gallery level, with brick infill. Boarded timber ceiling to main space; board-marked ceilings to low side aisles. Choir gallery with organ, designed by Pace, set behind timber lattice screen also to his designs, and reached via narrow spiral stair. Ceramic piece to balcony front 1999 by Helen Batty. Some pews, brought from the college’s former chapel of 1858 remodelled by Pace in the 1950s.
Hanging pendant light-fittings to Pace’s designs. Altar, lectern and altar seating all by Pace; pulpit designed 1998. Windows – internally the concrete of the mullions is exposed, all originally clear leaded lights, but now stained glass is being incorporated, most notably ‘The Water of Life’ by Cathy Nutkins, a 1990 graduate, in right-hand transept.
Chapel of Christ the Teacher to rear, by foyer, refurbished 1994 by Helen Turner, textile artist. The building is well-suited to the incorporation of student works of art, some temporary, some permanent, and additions are continually being made to the collection.
I had spent the day in Southampton in May, the first area I explored was Wyndham Court.
At the end of a long day I found myself there again, with an hour to spare before my train back to Bournemouth.
The sky was no longer blue, the sun was now occluded.
The photographs were almost monotone, so with a small tweak I made them monochrome.
Designed by Lyons Israel Ellis for Southampton City Council in 1966, ED Lyons being the partner in charge and architects Frank Linden and Aubrey Hume also assigned to the job.
The structural engineers were Hajnal-Konyi and Myers and the firm of builders was G Minter.
Lyons Israel Ellis, though well known as a finishing school for the famed likes of Stirling, Gowan, Colquhoun et al, were the sort of Brutalists that didn’t get Yale scholarships, shiny monographs or late careers in pomo. They are found more often designing local authority housing, comprehensive schools and other unsexy things – most of them robust enough to be extant and in good nick. From their Old Vic extension through to the London School of Engineering, they were giants of big, chunky, angular neo-constructivist architecture rife with skylines, cantilevers and complex geometries, all in satisfyingly raw, tactile concrete. As Colquhoun later put it, this was architecture for those who had nothing but contempt for ‘the Englishness of English art’ and other consolatory narratives.
Their masterpiece, Wyndham Court, ought to be as well-known as the Brunswick Centre or the Barbican, and isn’t largely because of where it is. It is a monumental, civic housing project on the grandest scale. As a building, it shows more than a hint of rhetoric creeping into LIE’s usually astringent aesthetic. Placed just outside Southampton Central Station with a fine view of the docks, its service tower skyline and long, streamlined volumes have more than a hint of the ocean liner about them. Here they arc around a square, with shops on the ground floor, high-density-city centre living for council tenants rather than as an aspirational loft-living lifestyle. A magnificent vote of confidence in a city which has built little of note since, it’s also, for me, the building that announces that I’m ‘home’ far less depressingly than BDP’s repugnant West Quay shopping centre on the other side of the railway line – a massive concrete statement that another city was and still is possible.
It’s been four years since our 2022 Wigan Walk – so time to see if there has been a refreshing change.
Beginning with a trip to the former flicks, the Princes Cinema now trading as Pure nightclub, sometimes home to Singo Bingo.
Originally the site of New Princes Theatre, opened on the 1st May 1911, the cinema was demolished and replaced, on an adjacent plot, by Princes Cinema in 1933.
Ofd special note the adjacent Electrical Substation of the day.
Plus extra added military history.
Seventies
Tucked in behind the Telephone Exchange are several streets of Edwardian social housing – the Spring Gardens Scheme of 1905.
The property is practically paying its way, and all the present generation has to find is a small sum of ninety odd pounds for sinking funds. For this we get fifty-nine families decently housed, the rateable value of the town increased, a slum abolished, an eyesore removed, the health of the inhabitants remarkably improved, their environment made clean, refined, and elevating, whilst our successors in 1959 will inherit an unencumbered estate.
It was demolished in 1985 as part of a wider redevelopment of the town centre to make way for the Galleries Shopping Centre. A new bus station, built at a cost of £2.3 million, began construction in April 1986, and opened in November 1987.
Wikipedia
Transport for Greater Manchester commissioned Austin-Smith:Lordto design a replacement nineteen stand £15.7m bus station in Wigan Town Centre, the project was completed in October 2018.
DJ Russ Winstanley was a former pupil, here he is in 1975 at the Wigan Casino holding up a copy of Footsee by Wigan’s Chosen Few b/w Seven Days Too Long by Chuck Wood.
Across the way to Scholes Comprehensive Development 1964
Five thirteen-storey tower blocks adjacent to Douglas House in Scholes were approved in 1964. Lower-rise housing and flats spread to the east. In 1968, a further 13-storey block, Boyswell House, was built at this eastern end of the Scholes Comprehensive Development Area. Almost 500 slum houses, housing 566 families, were demolished that same year and 581 new council homes completed.
Next to the Roger Booth cop shop that became a Premier Inn.
A super-comfy bed, blackout curtains, a powerful shower and free Wi-Fi – our double rooms have everything you’ll need for a great night’s sleep.
Next door the Wigan & Leigh Courthouse 1992 Wigan MBC Architect.
Relief figure of justice by Christine Ward.
Onward to Brocol House – currently home to the Job Centre
Image – Wigan Peers
Originally built for the Inland Revenue one the site of the Brewers Arms – has the welcoming charm shared by the majority of Ministry of Works buildings of the period.
Nearly done – up the road to the County Playhouse.
The club’s atmosphere is defined by thumping musicand a vibrant crowd eager to dance and celebrate. Its modern interior design complements the lively ambience, creating an inviting space for locals and visitors alike.
Construction began on the County Playhouse in 1916. However, due to a shortage of materials and labour during World War I, it was not completed until 1919.
Finally opened on 22nd December 1919 with The Hun Within – starring Dorothy Gish.
The County Playhouse closed on Sunday 13th November 1966 with Disney’s “The Sword and the Stone”. It was taken over by the Leeds Based Star Cinemas chain and they converted it into Star Bingo and Social Club opened on 24th November 1966.
MAS sales store 1982 – Frank Orrell Photography
The building has since been used as a discount store and Playhouse Club Café. It then became home to the 1,200 capacity Pure Nightclub. In the early-2000’s it became the Ibiza nightclub. The Pure nightclub move into the former Princes Cinema
Time for a swift half in The George to end your tour?
Great for a local pint one of the cheapest in Wigan I believe, slightly rough at times but no fights just real local people who are generally friendly. Proper drinking gaff, and karaoke on certain nights.
1971 built of a pre-cast concrete panel system, dour, on an awkwardly sloping site.
I beg to differ – what’s the opposite of dour?
So says the online Thesaurus – and I heartily concur, for the whole building has had a makeover and a half.
Civic is a super energy-efficient workspace in the centre of Wigan town centre. The BREEAM Excellent building has space for business of all sizes, from desks for solo start-ups, all the way to big open plan offices with their own front door.
The brutalist beast has been lovingly restored by Capital&Centric to celebrate its architecture, with original waffle ceilings, corduroy concrete and stunning feature windows that flood the space with light.
It was great to visit and tour Wigan Civic Centre on Millgate, to see the inspiring work being done to create sustainable workspaces and amenities in the centre of our town. This development, alongside others taking place and planned across the North West, will help to revitalise our public spaces
With students, start-ups and professionals situating themselves elsewhere in Greater Manchester, Wigan town had been missing out on the economic and cultural vitality that high quality workspace brings. Civic’s transformation represents not just the overhaul of a tired concrete building, but a wider renewal of place and opportunity for Wigan.
Working with Wigan Council and Capital & Centric, we completed the refurbishment of the 50,000 sq ft building that is Wigan Civic Centre. Delivering aspirational office accommodation to stimulate economic growth with the goal to create a lasting social impact in Wigan. In addition to exemplar market-leading workspace, amenities include a rooftop terrace, mini cinema, gym studio and co-working/coffee shop space.
Here’s the exterior.
Many thanks to the Cotton CaféBar for kindly allowing us in after hours.
Ultimately, civic stands as a symbol of optimism for Wigan, proving that intelligent commercial design can catalyse economic renewal, secure a sustainable future, and truly lift a town’s spirits, without erasing its history. It is a gold standard for the adaptive reuse of 20th-century landmarks.
To begin at the middle, the middle of the Twentieth Century, houses may have looked like this:
Or possibly these:
These Shore Road survivors have resisted the charm of redevelopment, the demolition and new build, or the uPVC over cladding, relentless render or reglaze.
So what happened to houses that look like houses?
This upwardly mobile trend, fuelled by the rakish progress on the so called property ladder, fanned by 80’s Thatcherite tax cuts, and the ever so irresistible allure of conspicuous consumption.
Architectural historian Virginia Savage McAlester, coined the term Millennium Mansion, though these houses are also referred to as a McMansion, Persian Palace, Garage Mahal, Starter Castle, and Hummer House.
Marketing parlance often uses the term tract mansions or executive homes.
Let’s take a closer look at the look of luxury, is it playful and witty pastiche or Post Modern mumbo jumbo – un repas de chien.
We are a small Anglican parish situated on the south coast of England between Bournemouth and Poole in the county of Dorset, which is part of the Church of England Diocese of Salisbury. We hope that this site may help you to gain a flavour of what we have to offer. We enjoy wonderful views across Poole Harbour – the second largest natural harbour in the world after Sydney, to the Purbeck Hills, as well as some of the best beaches in the country.
The two churches in the Parish are the Parish Church of the Transfiguration, and the Chapel of St. Nicolas. Both churches are open every day during daylight hours for quiet contemplation and prayer.
The Church of the Transfiguration is one of the youngest ecclesiastical buildings in the county, having been built during 1962-5 to a design by Lionel Gregory, who was also responsible for an interesting industrial unit in the nearby Nuffield Industrial estate.
When Sir Nikolaus Pevsner visited the church, which cannot have been long after it was built, he observed that it was.
A bungaloid church, the exact ecclesiastical equivalent of Dunromin and Thistledo, with crazy-paved walling and saw-toothed dormers.
It is certainly true that the walls are clad in crazy-paved walling and the dormers are saw-toothed, but this was a little unfair.
Poole Dolphin Leisure Centre offers a modern gym with sixty stations, four pools including a main, teaching and diving pool, plus award-winning swimming and diving lessons. Enjoy casual swims, fitness sessions and a wide range of group classes for all ages. After your workout, relax in our sauna and experience fitness, fun and wellbeing all in one place.
I can’t speak for the facilities, or their general cleanliness, I don’t swim or have much time for leisure.
Walking around looking at things, taking pictures, chatting and such is my lifestyle choice and preoccupation.
So here’s a snapshot of the centre’s exterior, with particular attention paid to the concrete relief.
As an aside the nearby Dolphin Shopping Centre was once known as The Arndale.
In 1957 discussions began about creating a covered in shopping centre in the heart of Poole town centre, in a similar vein to those popular at the time in America. In 1963 property developers were invited by Poole Corporation to present schemes to develop this shopping centre as part of a redevelopment of the town.
The winning scheme was for a two million pound redevelopment by the Arndale Property Trust on land at High Street, Seldown Lane and Kingland Road] known as the Ladies Walking Field. One of the main reasons Arndale won was that their proposal incorporated a fully enclosed shopping centre. The scheme was to be designed by Leslie Jones and Partners in association with Geoffrey Hopkinson; Poole Borough Architect and Chief Planning Officer, the structural engineers were to be Bowden Sillett and Partners and the main contractors were to be Sir Lindsay Parkinson and Company.
The transformation of Poole Town Centre started in June 1966 when work began on a new road layout and construction of the shopping centre commenced in March 1967 when the then Mayor of Poole, Alderman Ron Hart, dug the first turf.
In 1989 an eight million pound refurbishment programme was carried out on the centre, which emerged with a new name ; The Dolphin Shopping Centre.
In February 2025, reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete RAAC was found at the shopping centre. The final Beales department store in the UK will close at the end of May 2025.
To ensure the shopping centre remains popular and well occupied, the owner LGIM Real Assets is investing in the redevelopment of the internal malls and various retail buildings within the site. Designed by tp bennett, a programme of refurbishment is underway with the aim of delivering a more exciting and modern retail experience to help attract shoppers and retailers. The scheme includes new stores for H&M, New Look and JD Sports as well a new mixed-use leisure development, with a multiplex cinema, restaurants and a refreshed public realm.
It will be a huge transformation and there is a real local desire for it.
Part of wider improvement works in Poole, it is hoped that this major investment will enhance the customer experience, and reinforce the centre as a popular, family-friendly retail and entertainment destination.
Barclays House was constructed by Barclays bank from 1972 to 1975 as part of a move to decentralise its offices from London.
The structure, was designed in the Brutalist style by architects Wilson, Mason and Partners. It consists of three main wings, each octagonal in plan, and dominates the town centre skyline.
Barclays first occupied the office in January 1976. The building’s basement is below sea level and is often flooded or damp, which prevented its use by the bank for storage. The structure has also sunk over time due to its significant mass
Barclays left the site in January 2022 and put the structure up for sale by sealed bid auction. The highest bidder was Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council but they withdrew from the purchase in September 2022.
BCP offered £17 million, almost three times more than the next highest bidder, thought to be Fortitudo at £6.5 million, who wanted to demolish the structure and build three apartment towers.
In February 2023, boarding was put up around the building and the Bournemouth Daily Echo reported that a new buyer had been found. In November 2023, proposals for redevelopment to residential use were announced, 362 flats are proposed for the building.
Town hall planner Gareth Ball has given the go-ahead for VCRE Four Poole Limited to convert the historic building into a 362-bedroom apartment block.
No parking spaces will be available for the future residents, as noted by BCP case officer Mr Ball as being in accordance with the council’s rules. Instead, the development will come with 488 cycle spaces – or one space for every resident. The scheme will feature a gym, communal workspace, squash courts, a games room with table tennis, pool, video games, surfboard storage and a rooftop garden.
Barclays House was bought last year for £5.3 million, according to documents.
Here are the photographs I took in May 2026 – incorporating the multi storey car park.
But what of the future?
This recent ARC projectinvolves transforming the former Barclays building in Poole into 362 modern residential flats while preserving the existing building’s façade. This project focuses on revitalising a heritage landmark by repurposing it with innovative designs that offer easy access to public transport, exceed space standards for comfort and practicality, and create a strong sense of community through shared internal and external amenities.
After twenty years, the waterproofing on the top deck of the busy Avenue Road council car park in Bournemouth was failing. Water was penetrating the structure and dripping onto users’ cars on the lower levels and also into a tenant’s offices situated below. More importantly, this was affecting the structural integrity of the car park.
Being close to the sea, the car park is subjected to highly corrosive moisture and salt levels, which if left unprotected could cause long term structural damage. And indeed, further investigation by the contractors Concrete Repairs Ltd. and Triflex’s Technical Team revealed that part of the concrete substrate was cracking and failing causing potential health and safety issues.
As a result, the council needed to refurbish the car park and have a reliable waterproofing solution that would extend the car park’s service life. In addition, this work needed to be finished before the start of the busy summer tourist period.
Concrete Repairs Ltd. and the Triflex Technical Team visited the site to complete an extensive site survey. Testing was also conducted to determine the suitability and compatibility of the substrate and the requirements for its preparation. Triflex DeckFloor was specified for the decks with DeckFloor Ramp System to provide a more aggressive aggregate was to the ramps and inclined areas of the car park. The ramp system incorporates emery aggregate which provides additional traction for those harder wearing areas.
Always a pleasure to walk the spiral ramp of a multi-storey car park, with the extra added pleasure of a passing motorist enquiring after my well being.
“Are You Lost?”
“No I’m taking pictures, but thanks anyway, if I ever am lost I’ll certainly know who to ask.”
Something of an anomaly, combining accommodation with a leisure facility.
The Outlook is ideally suited to students looking for quality, self catering, en suite accommodation in central Bournemouth, just a minute’s walk from the town’s excellent amenities.
The student accommodation has recently completed a comprehensive refurbishment, the work which included considerable redesign, new furnishings and decoration.
Excitingly close to Oasis Fun Bournemouth’s No.1 indoor fun centre.
Want to keep the kids entertained?
Then why not visit Oasis Fun today for a fun-filled experience for the whole family. We have an amazing bowling alley with six lanes, an indoor soft play centre, large Adventure Golf course, arcades and pool tables. Oh, and we have a café serving snacks and a fully licensed bar.
The large and colourful mural in Hamtun Street in Southampton’s Old Town charts the history of the city from Roman Clausentum and Saxon Hamwic, to the modern docks and football.
The mural was commissioned by Sainsbury’s to decorate the façade of their supermarket in Lordshill, Southampton.
The 19m long and 3m high mural consists of thirty seven concrete and glass mosaic panels depicting landmark buildings and iconicevents from Southampton’s history.
Thanks to a grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund, the mural was cleaned and restored by ceramic artist Oliver Budd.
Artist and conservator Oliver Budd creates and restores mosaics for public and private commissions. Budd Mosaics was set up in 1960 by Kenneth Budd, a contemporary of Henry and Joyce Collins. Kenneth invented the technique of prefabricating mosaics in the studio on aluminium mesh panels.
By July 2011 it was installed at Hamtun Street in the heart of the Old Town.
A cross-section of the local community helped create a new mural depicting contemporary Southampton. The design was inspired by ideas from young people at Prince’s Trust, residents of Ironside Court, parents from St. John’s School and local people who attended mosaic workshops led by artist Joanna Dewfall.
Joanna Dewfall’s design captures the city’s iconic buildings, maritime industry and present-day life. The border, made during mosaic workshops, contains themes from past and present celebrating Southampton’s cultural diversity.
The new mural is located on Castle Way, round the corner from the Hamtun Street Mural.
My first encounter with the work of Henry and Joyce Collins, was on the side of the former BHS in Stockport.
Modern Mooch 