Kings Centre

The Kings Centre is a former School Board office building constructed in 1888 for the Bootle School Board, designed by Thomas Cox in the 19th-century Queen Anne style. This two-storey plus attic building features an asymmetrical picturesque composition with variously hipped and gabled Welsh slate roofs. The structure is built of red brick in English Garden Wall Bond with pressed red brick facings to the north and west elevations, Cefn sandstone dressings, and distinctive stone banding to the principal facades.

Exterior

The main north elevation, facing Balliol Road, centres on a large doorway with an elaborately carved surround incorporating scrolls, shields, fleur-de-lis, and foliage. Above this sits a broken pediment containing an inscribed relief reading 'SCHOOL BOARD OFFICES', flanked by two carved rosettes. The original three-light fanlight remains, though the main door has been replaced.

To the left of this entrance, the elevation is surmounted by a large Flemish gable featuring a carved stone relief depicting a rock lighthouse taken from the Borough of Bootle crest, representing the borough's position at the mouth of the River Mersey. Below this is a roundel window. Large four-light mullion and transomed windows appear on both floors, with three to the first floor and two to the ground floor. The first-floor windows have lost part of their upper stone mullions and transoms, possibly due to World War II damage. Stone reliefs above the first-floor windows depict profiled heads of the Roman goddess Minerva looking toward the centre on the left and right, whilst the central relief shows the letters 'B S B' (Bootle School Board). The ground floor windows feature carved upper mullions with fleur-de-lis designs, also taken from the Borough crest. A balcony with an ornately carved parapet supported by carved brackets incorporates the pediment of the main entrance.

The right side of the north elevation projects slightly forward with the appearance of a squat tower with angled sides. It has a steeply pitched roof, polygonal to the front and gabled to the rear like a dormer, with a finial and parapet wall at the eaves line. A large six-light mullion and transomed window with carved upper mullions occupies the ground floor. The first floor features two four-light windows to the front and a two-light window to each angled side, flanked by Doric-styled pilasters and a dentil cornice that continues around the south return. Decorative stone panels above the lintels include fleur-de-lis carvings to the centre.

The west elevation, facing King's Road, features a large central Dutch gable with an attic window containing replaced 20th-century glazing. The central and right bays project slightly forward. The central bay contains a six-light mullion and transomed window with plain mullions at ground floor level, and an eight-light window flanked by two-light windows at first floor level. Small square stone panels appear above the upper lights. The left bay follows the same design as the main north elevation. The right bay contains a second main entrance door with a decorative surround incorporating pilasters and a scrolled pediment containing an obscured inscribed relief, probably reading 'SCHOOL BOARD'. The original entrance doors survive. Two small windows above feature a decorative broken pediment beneath a hipped roof. A gabled single-storey section, formerly used as a public waiting room, adjoins the entrance with two large sash windows and an end stack.

The east elevation is of plain brick with pressed brick bands. It features a large decorative stack currently leaning inwards, and an end stack serving the gabled single-storey waiting room.

The rear elevation includes decorative ventilation grills, three tall casement windows to the waiting room flanked by two shorter casements, stone lintels and sills, and a dormer window at the east end of the roof. A brick lean-to at the west end provides access into the yard, which is enclosed by a high brick wall to the west, a house to the south, and the boiler house to the east.

Interior

The ground floor Balliol Road entrance hall features an encaustic, geometrically patterned tiled floor. To the left is a large former committee room with original architraves, deep skirting, decorative deep moulded cornice, and part of a moulded dado. To the right is a former clerk's office with a general office behind linked by a connecting door; both retain architraves, fielded panel doors, and skirting.

The King's Road entrance vestibule has a tiled floor in the same style as the main hall, with tiling continuing into the stair hall. To the left of this entrance is a former general office. To the right is the large former public waiting room with a king post truss roof, buff brick walls, glazed brick dado, intricate ventilation grills, dentil cornice (with some parts missing), replaced concrete floor, and obscured glazing to the dormer window. A vestibule beyond the northeast corner with a glazed skylight connects to the stair hall and committee room.

The main open-well stair is constructed of York stone with a walnut handrail and newel post and ornate wrought-iron balustrade. The first floor contains a former boardroom, now partitioned, with a ribbed ceiling, mullion and transomed windows opening onto the balcony, architraves, fielded panelled doors, skirting, and part of a picture rail. A door at the northwest corner leads into two partitioned former visitors' rooms that in turn lead back onto the landing. Two toilets open off the landing. The attic comprises two rooms.

History

The Kings Centre was originally constructed as the school board offices for the County Borough of Bootle in 1888. The Bootle School Board was founded in 1870 following the introduction of the Education Act and occupied various temporary accommodations around the borough until acquiring a suitable plot from Lord Derby in 1887. Thomas Cox was appointed architect, with Messrs D Sinclair Brothers as contractors and Messrs Leslie of Bootle as masons. The building work cost approximately £3,000, and the Board Office officially opened on 12 October 1888.

Following the Board's dissolution in 1903, the building served as a Pupil Teachers' Centre until 1910, then as a Trade Preparatory School for Boys until 1914, when it became home to the Municipal School of Art from the nearby Technical School (now replaced by the Oriel Centre). It has also been used as a clinic serving schools in the borough. More recently it has functioned as the Kings Centre, forming part of Hugh Baird College, and has been used for teaching tiling, painting, and decorating skills.

Significance

The Kings Centre is a distinctive and well-preserved example of an important late 19th-century educational building type related to the 1870 Education Act, the most influential piece of 19th-century education reform and legislation, which triggered a massive school building programme throughout England and transformed education provision management through the Board System. Whilst many late 19th-century Board Schools survive nationally, Board offices of this quality are far less common and consequently of special interest.

This example is a striking and highly embellished 19th-century eclectic Queen Anne design using high-quality materials and incorporating into its decoration many references to educational ideals and its civic context and role. In its little-altered state and with good interior survival, the Kings Centre forms an important component of Bootle's civic core. It also has group value with the other buildings forming Bootle's civic core situated across Balliol Road, comprising the town hall, former free library, former post office, former police station and magistrates' court, and baths frontage.