Uppingham School Library

The Uppingham School Library, originally a hospital and chapel, dates from 1584, with substantial alterations and extensions in the 19th and 20th centuries, including work by T.G. Jackson and Oliver Hill. It is constructed of coursed squared ironstone with Collyweston stone slate roofs and coped gables with finials. The building comprises two parallel ranges running east-west; the south range was originally the hospital, and the north range, now taller, occupies the site of the chapel, incorporating what appears to be reused stonework.

The south front is one storey and attic. It features a plinth and an ovolo-moulded cornice. The ground floor has stone mullioned windows, mostly ovolo-moulded, although the three westernmost windows are 19th-century replacements with chamfered surrounds. The two westernmost also have transoms. Five 2-light dormers are set beneath coped gables with finials of varying design; all windows have leaded panels. The east end has a 19th-century 3-light window with a transom, and a c.1968 flat-roofed canted extension with a 3-light ovolo-moulded mullioned window. The interior was gutted, reroofed, and converted to a library around 1890 by T.G. Jackson. It now has a Jacobean revival fireplace at the west end and decorative plasterwork to the vaulted ceiling.

The north range is five windows wide and one lofty storey. It has a west end stack and an ogee Gothick cupola with a weathervane dated 1825, marking a rebuilding and heightening. The final bay, east of a buttress, and the canted east end stair turret with gable on decorative kneelers date from around 1890, reusing old stones, some of which are carved with pupils’ names and initials. The tall rectangular windows in this section have slightly convex leaded panes.

A doorway to the west, in a 4-centred hollow-chamfered arch (beneath a carved vesica and memorial inscription), leads into a World War II Memorial by Oliver Hill. This is a full-height barrel-vaulted space lined and floored with patterned marble, with a niche to the south displaying the names of the fallen, and a pedimented doorway to the east, leading into the north range of the library itself. Inside the north range is "stripped classical" panelling and a gallery to the south.

The hospital and chapel were founded by Robert Johnson, Archdeacon of Leicester, at the same time as the school. During the 18th century, the school took over the hospital building as a boarding house, initially using the chapel as a dining hall.