Fairbairn House

Fairbairn House, Nos. 71, 73 and 75 Clarendon Road, Leeds

A large house, now institute, built in 1840-41 with later additions. Formerly attributed to John Clark but probably designed by R.D. Chantrell for Peter Fairbairn, engineer and owner of the Wellington Foundry. The building is constructed of red brick with stone plinth and dressings, and has a slate roof.

The house is Classical in style, comprising 2 storeys with basement and attic, 7 windows wide. The principal feature is a giant Corinthian portico at the centre with heavy entablatures and a deep blind balustrade parapet to the attic storey above; the entablature continues over the outer bays to corner pilasters. The central entrance has a pedimented doorway with plate-glass sashes. The flanking windows and three first-floor windows are set in stone architraves, with the outer pairs featuring rubbed brick flat arches.

Interior: The ground floor displays elaborate plaster decoration throughout in Greek style. The entrance hall features fluted columns in antis and a cross corridor. An Imperial staircase with scroll-decorated cast-iron balustrade and moulded ramped mahogany handrail rises to a round-arched niche on the half-landing, topped by a circular top light with heavily moulded cornice. To the left is the service stair of straight flights extending to the attic storey, with turned balusters, ball finials to newel posts, and wooden handrail. A third stair, far right, has an oval newel with stone steps and cast-iron balusters in Egyptian style with ramped wooden handrail; it provides access to the basement, which is reputed to be built with cast-iron beams in the manner of fire-proof mill construction.

Principal rooms retain original fittings: the ground-floor left front room has moulded 6-panel doors, dado, and moulded wall panels; the left rear room contains a fireplace with fluted Classical columns and panelled plaster ceiling; the rear right room has a bay window and deep ceiling cornice with egg-and-dart and acroteria; the front right room features a marble fireplace, deep carved architraves to windows, modillion ceiling cornice, and an alcove in the end wall. The chapel, now a lecture theatre, has an inserted floor but retains original double doors and a ribbed barrel-vaulted ceiling. The first-floor cross corridor runs the full width of the house, with false double doors in architraves decorated with console brackets, cornices with wreaths. An early 20th-century extension extends to the right.

Historical note: Peter Fairbairn was mayor when Queen Victoria visited Leeds to open the new Town Hall in 1858, and the Queen stayed at this house during that visit. Fairbairn's son, Sir Andrew, auctioned off the grounds as building plots in 1865 and lived at the house until 1870. A member of the Gott family subsequently occupied the property before it became a vicarage, then a nursing home, and later the Leeds Clergy School. As part of the University of Leeds' property, the house became a hall of residence and is currently the residential and conference facility of the Nuffield Institute for Health Services Studies.