Burnley Mechanics

The building is a Mechanics' Institute, later adapted as a theatre and arts centre, dating from 1854-5. It was designed by James Green of Todmorden and enlarged in 1888 by William Waddington, with subsequent alterations. Constructed in sandstone ashlar with felted hipped roofs, the building is an impressive example of the palazzo style. It occupies a corner site with later extensions to the left and rear.

The symmetrical main range features a five-window facade and is two storeys high, with basements to the rear. The lower level has emphatic rustication, with quoins on the first floor, a panelled band between floors interrupted by balustraded balconies, a string course, a plain frieze, and a prominent modillioned cornice enriched with lion masks. The ground floor is characterised by round-headed arcaded openings arranged in two sets of three. These openings feature emphatic rusticated voussoirs and keystones, linked by an impost band. Each set includes paired Venetian windows flanking a narrower arch, with a window in the first, a doorway in the second, and Ionic colonnettes within the Venetian windows. The windows now have plate glass. The first floor has a tripartite window centrally, flanked by two pairs of windows, all with pedimented Corinthian architraves and balustraded balconies.

To the left of the main range is a two-storey extension, also in a generally similar style, with a splayed corner. It features pilastered architraves to the windows and a wide round-headed doorway connecting to the main range. The return wall to York Street has a tetrastyle Corinthian porch in the centre, with three round-headed windows on either side, mirroring the front facade, including a tripartite window with Corinthian architrave and segmental pediment on the first floor. A rear extension, slightly stepped back and imitating the fenestration of the front, continues from the York Street return wall.

The interior has been altered.