Download - Masterplanning progress: Technology, teaching and architecture

Masterplanning progress: Technology, teaching and architecture. Richard Brook Manchester School of Architecture Manchester Modernist Society Library Talks 29th October 2014 18.00 – 19.30

Cover. City of Manchester Plan, 1945

Cover. Manchester Education Precinct. The Final Report of the Planning Consultants, 1967.

Cover. Manchester Education Precinct, 1974. A Summary of the Review of the Plan.

Our Blitz. Manchester Corporation produced booklet sold to raise money for reconstruction + emergency welfare.

An exhibition to accompany the publication of the Plan was presented at the City Art Gallery between July and September of 1945 and occupied the full suite of ten galleries, each room dedicated to a component of the Plan. Housing, Neighbourhood Planning and District Planning took up a large proportion of the space, including the proposed extension of the Wythenshawe estate. Much has been made of the importance of the City Centre and Educational Centre elements and chapters of the Plan, but the proportion of space allotted to residential development within the exhibition perhaps reflects an acknowledgment of the publics’ interest and the continuing lack of provision of good corporation housing stock. The display was so successful that the opening hours were extended and over 155,000 people visited in the course of seven weeks; the patronage was twice that of the second most popular show that year. Manchester and District Planning Exhibition - 1945, pamphlet to accompany exhibition, printed by Henry Blacklock and Co. Ltd., Albert Square, Manchester.

Plan for the centre of culture education and medicine. Extract from 1945 Plan.

University extensions and College of Technology. Sir Hubert Worthington, 1945.

Concert Hall and Civic Hall – “quiet & dignified”. G. Noel Hill, City Architect, 1945.

The Cultural Centre. G. Noel Hill, City Architect, 1945.

New hospitals. Sir Hubert Worthington, 1945.

University Development Plan. Sir Hubert Worthington, 1958. VUoM Estates Archive

Freddie Williams Alan Turing Williams & Kilburn at the control panel

Both Tom Kilburn and Fred Williams, pioneers in the development of computers at Manchester University, had also been at the MSTRE during the war, working on data storage and calculating machines. The presence of these individuals in one place at the same time and their personal connections may have been one reason why Bowden was so voracious in his sponsorship of the education proposals and in their implementation in Manchester specifically. He wrote, ‘[t]he college will perform a vitally important service for the industry of the country as a whole and of this district in particular’ and that ‘[i]t is our responsibility and privilege to pioneer.’ Bowden was aware of the progress being made by American business in the use of computing and conscious that the advantages gained from work at Bletchley Park and other research institutes were at risk as Britain failed to capitalise on the commercial possibilities of its innovation; ‘At least a thousand million dollars worth of digital computers have been made and sold in America – many of them are being used for business. Not more than a couple of million pounds worth of computers have yet been sold in England… Although so much of the early development of these machines was done in this country it looks as if the first fruits of the revolution they portend may be reaped elsewhere.’

Postcard showing Students’ Union Building, 1956. Moberley Tower & Refectory, 1960-65. J.S. Beaumont & Sons

City’s current road proposals. Extract from Manchester education precinct : interim report of planning consultants.

Precinct Plan. Extract from Manchester education precinct : interim report of planning consultants.

Model. Extract from Manchester education precinct : interim report of planning consultants.

University area. Extract from Manchester education precinct : interim report of planning consultants.

Roscoe Building. Cruickshank & Seward, 1964. The Schuster Laboratories (1964) part of a suite of buildings by H.S. Fairhurst & Sons on Brunswick Street. Image courtesy MMU Visual Resourcess Centre.

The Elements, Hans Tisdall, 1967 on the entrance of Chemistry Building by H.S. Fairhurst & Sons. Image courtesy MMU Visual Resources Centre.

University matriculation board building. Playne & Lacey & Partners, 1964. Image courtesy of MMU Visual Resources Centre.

Humanities Building. Building Design Partnership, 1964. Image courtesy MMU Visual Resources Centre.

College area. Extract from Manchester education precinct : interim report of planning consultants.

Extract from Manchester education precinct : interim report of planning consultants.

Estimated life of property survey. Scan from City Engineer’s microcards, courtesy Archives+

Those dark, satanic mills

Jackson's Mill, UMIST campus area prior to development A view looking approximately south from the UMIST Main Building, now the Sackville Street Building of the University of Manchester. Jackson's Mill was the first building to be adapted for use by UMIST, prior to the building, in turn, of Staff House, Renold Building and Pariser Building.

Sackville Street main building extension. Bradshaw Gass & Hope, 1927-1957. Images courtesy John Rylands Library.

Dr. Bertram Vivian Bowden was aged forty-two and leading the computer sales division at Ferranti industries when public speculation began over his appointment as Principal of the College of Technology. Bowden had been educated at Chesterfield Grammar School and Emmanuel College, Cambridge. He worked with Ernest Rutherford in the 1930s and published co-authored papers on the subject of the properties of gamma radiation. During the war he was posted to Washington D.C. and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the development of radar, leading a British team in his role as principal scientific advisor to the Ministry of Supply’s Telecommunications Research Establishment (MSTRE). This exposure to the situation of military technological research in well-funded higher education institutions dramatically influenced Bowden and would come to shape his collaborative approach in the future.

Manchester College of Technology, plans for expansion, Scheme 2. Drawing prepared by office of Sir Hubert Worthington, 1954. Plans held in Minutes of Building Committee, Manchester University Archives.

Model. Images courtesy Tom Swailes

If our plan is to achieve its proper objective, the buildings we erect must be sited with dignity and propriety, and in such a way that the sun and air can penetrate the buildings and the spaces between them; there must be large courts, trees and lawns allowing vistas of the buildings, so that the environment will bring pride and pleasure both to the occupants and to the passers by. Lord Bowden

Site clearance. Image courtesy Tom Swailes

Aerial view courtesy John Rylands Library

Renold Building perspective sketch. Image courtesy FDG, Cruickshank and Seward archive

Model & view of completed building. Images courtesy FDG, Cruickshank and Seward archive. The Renold building was the first of four significant buildings on the UMIST campus by architect W.A. Gibbon of Cruickshank and Seward. The brief for the building was for a series of lecture theatres and the associated circulatory space. It was intended that this building would bring together disparate department related lecture rooms to one central location. The scheme takes the form of a podium and tower, housing large and smaller lecture rooms respectively. The tower was positioned as far away from the adjacent railway viaduct as possible and the podium acoustically insulated by virtue of the significant topographical shift between the viaduct, the parallel street and the rest of the campus to the south."

Fixing shear links to post-tensioned concrete beams in the Renold Building. The beams are supported above the C Floor concourse on circular reinforced concrete columns and provide a platform structure supporting more conventional reinforced concrete framing above. A similar form of construction had been used a year or so earlier for the Marks and Spencer Building in Manchester. Image courtesy Tom Swailes.

Renold Building and Pariser Building under construction c.1960 Image courtesy Tom Swailes

Pariser and Renold building completed. Image courtesy MMU Visual Resources Centre.

Chandos Hall, Cruickshank and Seward, 1963. Images courtesy FDG, Cruickshank and Seward archive.

Construction and completion. Images courtesy FDG, Cruickshank and Seward archive. At this time, halls of residence were being considered in light of the University Grants Committee’s Niblett report, which emphasised the educational benefit for students who lived on campus. The building appears to stand alone, almost monolithic; British Railways demanded an easement of six metres from the viaduct. When completed the building had thirteen residential floors with a mixture of single and twin rooms, there were also communal kitchens and the top floor housed the warden’s residence with access to a roof terrace and a larger common room for student parties.

Barnes Wallis Building. Cruickshank and Seward, 1966. Photograph by Sam Lambert. Image courtesy of FDG, Cruickshank and Seward archive.

Manchester College of Technology, plans for expansion, Scheme 5. Plans for Area B. Drawing prepared by office of Sir Hubert Worthington, 1961. Plans held in Minutes of Building Committee, Manchester University Archives.

Barnes Wallis Building. Cruickshank and Seward, 1966. Photographs by Sam Lambert. Image courtesy of FDG, Cruickshank and Seward archive. The Student Union and the refectory are housed at ground and first floors respectively, within the podium element of the building. The tower has a repeated floor plan, the common rooms and kitchen separated from the study bedrooms by the vertical circulation core, the expressive flourish at the head is intended to draw light into the space. The large meeting room at first floor originally had stunning bespoke chandeliers by artist Michael Yeomans which were 10ft diameter tensegrity structures formed from steel tubing and piano wire. The manipulation of the natural datum here, to achieve an external courtyard space and separate service access, is particularly evident and successful.

Chemical Engineering Pilot Plant. H.S. Fairhurst & Sons, 1966. Image courtesy MMU Visual Resources Centre.

Maths and Social Science building. Cruickshank and Seward 1968. Photograph by Sam Lambert. Image courtesy FDG, Cruickshank and Seward archive. W.A. Gibbon defined the UMIST campus with his modernist essay sweeping across the land between Granby Row and Mancunian Way. In his words, the fifteen storey tower element was “positioned to form a strong visual feature as one proceeds towards the city”.

Maths and Social Science building. Cruickshank and Seward, 1968.

UMIST, painting by Peter Sainsbury. Image courtesy John Sheard, former partner Cruickshank & Seward.

Aerial view courtesy John Rylands Library

Street level view. Pre-phase II of Mancunian Way

Greetings from Manchester.

View from Sackville Street towards Oxford Road. Image courtesy of MMU Visual Resources Centre.

John Dalton Building, Phase 1. S.G. Besant-Roberts, City Architect, 1964. Image courtesy of MMU Visual Resources Centre.

Extract from British Association of Science conference proceedings, 1962.

Universities masterplan model. Image provided by John Sheard, former partner Cruickshank & Seward.

Student village. Image courtesy John Sheard, former partner Cruickshank & Seward.

Comprehensive Development Areas. 1964-67.

Extract from Report of the Chief Planning Officer, John Millar, 1965-66.

Site areas under consideration by Wilson Womersley for Manchester Education Precinct. Extract from MEP The Final Report of the Planning Consultants, 1967.

Hospital masterplan. Fry, Drew + Partners, 1965.

Extract from United Manchester hospitals: basic master plan

Plan at October 1968. Extract from MEP The Final Report of the Planning Consultants, 1967.

Plan at October 1972. Extract from MEP The Final Report of the Planning Consultants, 1967.

Major elements of land use 1984. Extract from MEP The Final Report of the Planning Consultants, 1967.

Maths Tower. Scherrer & Hicks, 1968. Model.

Images courtesy of Prof. Nick Higham.

Maths Tower. Scherrer & Hicks, 1968. Opening brochure and postcard.

Maths Tower. Scherrer & Hicks, 1968. View from Oxford Road.

Image courtesy MMU Visual Resources Centre.

Maths Tower. Scherrer & Hicks, 1968. View up ramp.


Maths tower and Computer Building junction of ramps.


RNCM. Bickerdicke, Allen, Rich & Partners, 1968.

Aerial walkway to be connected.


Precinct Centre, Wilson Womerlsey, 1972, and RNCM .


Architecture and Planning Building. Hanson, Kantorowich and Partners, 1970. Image courtesy Jim Backhouse.

Architecture and Planning Building. Hanson, Kantorowich and Partners, 1970. Image courtesy MMU Visual Resources Centre.

The primacy of highways planning.

Medical School. H.S. Fairhurst & Sons, 1969-72. Image from brochure to commemorate opening.

Inner ring road planning and connections in the hospital area. Photo of plan from UoM Estates Archive

Institute Plan Extract from MEP The Final Report of the Planning Consultants, 1967.

City Colleges area 1984. Extract from MEP The Final Report of the Planning Consultants, 1967.

Proposed sports centre by Wilson Womersley. Elevation from The sports centre, Oxford Road, Manchester: final design scheme report October 1974. Visualisation from MEP 1974.

Landscape structure plan. Extract from MEP 1974.

Whitworth Park Student Housing. Building Design Partnership, 1972-76. Image courtesy MMU Visual Resources Centre.

Town and Gown. Plan from UoM Estates Archive.

Proposed BBC North HQ. Building Design Partnership, late 1960s. Image courtesy BDP.

BBC North, perspective sketch. Artist unkown. Architect R.A. Sparkes. http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/yourpaintings/paintings/new-headquarters-oxford-road-manchester-216653

Perspective sketch by Peter Sainsbury for Cruickshank and Seward, 1967. Image courtesy FDG, Cruickshank and Seward archive.

The National Computer Centre, UKAEA Architects under R.S. Brocklesby ARIBA. Image courtesy Archives+, M59279, H. Millington, 1971.

NCC, Ground Floor Plan. Cruickshank and Seward, 1969. Image courtesy FDG, Cruickshank and Seward archive.

Elevations of NCC and BBC. Courtesy FDG and BDP respectively.

NCC and BBC loking towards John Dalton Phase 2. Image courtesy MMU Visual Resources Centre.

Sheppard Robson masterplan model. Mid 1970s.

Holden gallery Café, MMU, M15 6BR. 23 October – 21 November 2014. contact: [email protected]