For over thirty year you have weathered the storms of public ignominy.
The unloved Dustbin – repository of Tameside Council’s officers and offices.
Last time I was here you were there.
Then along came the ‘dozers.
Vision Tameside has left you in tiny pieces.
– poked out your eyes and stamped you into the ground.
Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again. It seemed to me I stood by the iron gate leading to the drive, and for a while I could not enter, for the way was barred to me. There was a padlock and a chain upon the gate. I called in my dream to the lodge-keeper, and had no answer, and peering closer through the rusted spokes of the gate I saw that the lodge was uninhabited.
Once upon a time there were council offices – then slowly there were not.
Built in the 1980s and met with almost immediate public disdain.
Welcome to The Dustbin.
An octagonal brick face concrete hub, anchoring three six storey walls, which enclose a central open courtyard area. Housing all central local authority offices.
Famed as an imaginary TV police station, this civic building is a civic building I simply can’t resist. I return on a regular basis to wander and snap. This is an open public space that seems little loved and has few visitors.
It is quite literally concrete poetry incarnate, a careful collision of form, tone, texture and line, softened with sympathetic planting.
There had been proposals to extend the Town Hall provison since 1945, which were finally realised in 1975. Built at a cost of £1,500,000 – to provide additional office provision for the Local Authority. A further two blocks were planned but never built.
Stopford House was built 1975 and designed by JS Rank OBE, Director of Development & Town Planning, Stockport Council.
The main block is clad in 1400 exposed aggregate precast panels and the link blocks have ribbed walls constructed with in situ concrete, bush hammered to expose the limestone aggregate. The precast panels were carefully matched in order to harmonize with the existing Town Hall, the mix contained coarse aggregate from the Scottish Granite Company of Creetown, a fine Leemoor sand from the Fordamin Company, together with white cement.
There are two levels of underground parking beneath the whole of the development. The piazza betwen the blocks was to have had a water cascde falling into a pond running the whole length of the area. Though exciting and expansive in the modern manner the piazza area, sadly, seems little used.
It needs a little love pop by and say hello sometime.
Attached to the Civic Centre, developed and opened in 1977, to commemorate the Queen’s Silver Jubilee, she ain’t no human being, she’s a building.
An low exterior slab of classical municipal modernism, with a series of wonderful and surprising new attachments, ideal for all occasions!
The most amazing set of heavily patinated, square sectioned, inorganic pipes which are precipitously cantilevered onto the front elevation.
Illuminating!
The lobby boasts further exotic lighting, this time on the ceiling, and applied metal reliefs attached to the back wall and booking office.
I’ve never been in the main auditorium, yet – but life is full of little surprises.
Others have – boxers, boozers, bands, concerts, carousers, dancers, thespians – the lot.
The council have a mind to put a stop to all this wayward architecture and replace it something new, shiny and anonymous.
But they’re having to wait for the Men from the Ministry to cough up the cash – which may or may not be tied up in a nearby Northern Powerhouse, Mr Osborne may just have to be lead up the A62 by the nose, with a promise of the most popular Tea Dance in the area.
I do advise you to go and have a look before you can’t.
“The Civic Centre tower is the Oldham’s centre of local governance. The fifteen storey building has housed the vast majority of the council’s offices since its completion in 1977. Standing at the summit of the town, the tower stands over 200 feet 61 m high. It was designed by Cecil Howitt & Partners, and the topping out ceremony was held on 18 June 1976.The Civic Centre can be seen from as far away as Salford, Trafford, Wythenshawe and Winter Hill in Lancashire, and offers panoramic views across the city of Manchester and the Cheshire Plain.”
The low parts are by Richard Seifert & Partners 1962.
Part of the building joins onto an older office block which dates from the mid-1960s. That was originally headquarters for Oldham’s Regional Health Authority before their move to St. Peter’s Precinct.
I just stand back and gaze in wide wonder at this white giant resplendent against deep blue late Winter skies. High above the surrounding areas of Greater Manchester, it is more than a sum of its parts. The finest materials and finish, bold, optimistic and modern, singing of a civic pride that refuses to be diminished.
Having survived the slow and painful exodus of the cotton industry, and the consequent years of municipal under funding, Oldham is rebuilding itself, with this gem at its centre.
Further info and thanks to: East of the M60
Modern Mooch 