Samuel Alexander Building

The Samuel Alexander Building is a university Faculty of Arts building constructed between 1911 and 1919 to designs by Percy Scott Worthington of the Manchester architects' practice Thomas Worthington and Son. It is built of red, non-standard Ruabon brick with Portland stone dressings and a slate roof.

The building has an E-shaped plan. The central main entrance opens into a full-height entrance hall which divides the building into two halves, each with rooms opening off long corridors. The east and west wings terminate in lecture rooms, with a central lecture room located behind the entrance hall projecting to the rear.

Exterior

The symmetrical front elevation faces north. It is of two storeys with a basement. A central flight of stone steps leads up to a projecting, full-height Portland stone portico with two Roman Doric columns supporting an entablature inscribed FACULTY OF ARTS in gold lettering on the frieze, and a triangular pediment above. The door architrave incorporates the date 1919 in Roman numerals and features a relief carving of two putti holding a wreath encompassing a serpent (which appears on the university coat of arms), with the university motto ARDUS AD SOLEM (striving towards the sun) inscribed above. The architrave cornice has consoles, with an empty niche above flanked by further consoles. Projecting stone lion masks on the pediment are echoed in two angular bronze lion masks attached to the double panelled doors, which have part-glazed inner doors beyond.

To each side of the portico are five bays with the first floor set back from the single-storey ground-floor sections, flanked by projecting three-bay end pavilions. All are built of brick in English garden bond, with the plinth and basement level, entablatures and parapets in Portland stone. The end pavilions are articulated by giant brick pilasters and have six-over-nine pane sash windows on the ground and first floors. The single-storey ground-floor bays have parapets incorporating stone balustrading and stone architraves to the six-over-six pane sash windows. The set-back first-floor bays also have six-over-six pane sash windows.

The east and west wings are of three storeys with a basement. The east wing has eight bays and the west wing nine bays. Both are brick-built with brick parapets. The five north bays of both wings project slightly and are articulated by giant brick pilasters rising through the ground and first-floor levels, with Portland stone plinths and an entablature band over the pilasters. At second-floor level the east wing has a central brick niche flanked on each side by two windows separated by an oval stone medallion. The west wing has five windows at second-floor level interspersed with oval stone medallions. Windows are six-over-nine pane sashes on the ground and first floors, and six-over-six pane sashes on the second floors.

Interior

The central entrance hall is top-lit and features two Ionic columns of Portland stone at either end supporting an entablature and a coffered barrel roof. The floor is paved with stone flags primarily laid diagonally with black stone squares at the intersections. At the south end is a first-floor balcony with white-painted metal balustrades incorporating laurel leaf motifs and bronze handrails. It is reached by symmetrical staircases with similar balustrades, bronze handrails and newels, rising east and west from the hall to half-landings before returning to a central doorway opening onto the balcony. On each side of the hall are two doorways with original half-glazed doors flanking a central, tall, round-headed opening with glazed double doors and fanlight leading through to a wide corridor. To the rear of the hall is a round-headed doorway leading through to symmetrical east and west staircases descending to the basement level, with two sets of fielded-panel double doors opening into the large central lecture room from quarter-space landings with ceiling domes containing circular bronze ceiling lights. The lecture room rises through the basement and ground-floor levels. Towards the rear of the entrance hall stands a bronze bust of Samuel Alexander by Jacob Epstein, dated 1925, set on a rectangular marble plinth; the layout of the original stone flags has been altered to accommodate the plinth. Other notable features in the entrance hall include four original suspended bronze lanterns, circular bronze ceiling lights above and below the balcony, a copy of a section of the Parthenon Frieze above the entrance doorway, and notice boards. The lecture room has a coffered ceiling with modillion cornicing and original square bronze ceiling lights.

The wide corridors leading off to east and west on the ground floor are lit by high semi-circular windows in circular openings, with round-headed arcades to either side. Some openings contain fielded-panel office doors with bottom-hinged opening fanlights, while some are blind. The first-floor corridors have rooms on one side only, with similar doors with opening fanlights, and sash windows on the other interspersed with copies of sections of the Parthenon Frieze. On both floors the corridors return through round-headed archways in a southerly direction. The second-floor corridors are barrel-vaulted and top-lit, also with copies of sections of the Parthenon Frieze. Notable features include the wooden parquet flooring and original bronze ceiling, wall, and suspended lights which illuminate the corridors and staircases.

Individual rooms have parquet flooring, some with wooden corner mantelpieces (all now boarded), and decorative banding to the plaster ceilings. Some sub-dividing walls have been removed to increase room sizes. Some larger rooms, mostly lecture rooms, have modern suspended ceilings containing lighting and projection equipment beneath the plaster ceilings, whilst others have modern strip lighting. The basement lavatories have been refitted.

History

The Faculty of Arts building was a major commission for Percy Scott Worthington, who was knighted in 1935 and was a partner in the family firm of Thomas Worthington and Son (his father, the architect Thomas Worthington, died in 1909). Work commenced in 1911 but progressed slowly due to the onset of the First World War. At the opening ceremony on 7 November 1919, the University of Manchester conferred the degree of doctor of letters upon Worthington. The neo-classical building was subsequently positively reviewed in an article in the 1920 Architectural Review, and together with his Masonic Temple in Manchester, it was cited as a principal work when Worthington was awarded a gold medal in 1930 from the Royal Institute of British Architects. In 1925 the sculptor Jacob Epstein produced a bronze bust of Samuel Alexander, Professor of Philosophy at the university from 1893. It stands in the central entrance hall and the building was renamed the Samuel Alexander Building in 2007.

Later Additions

A 1950s west extension is not of special interest. Two circa-1970 ranges which run eastwards from the west extension and are linked on the east side by a covered corridor are not of special interest.