Bournville Quaker Meeting House

The Bournville Quaker Meeting House was built in 1905 by William Alexander Harvey, with later extensions. The building is constructed from red brick with limestone dressings and tiled roofs. It stands at the junction of Linden Road, Woodbrooke Road and the Green.

The original building had a rectangular plan orientated north-south, with short angled wings and a stair tower framing the main entrance on the southern gable end. Subsequent extensions have been added to the north and west.

The main range is a double-height structure with a pitched roof. The south gable end features a central doorway with a splayed opening and a Romanesque arch of five plain orders, containing timber doors. To either side are pairs of mullioned casement windows with diamond leaded glazing. Above is a large six-light window with a wide mullion and transoms. A sundial is mounted on an incised stone panel within the gable. Stone bands, quoins and moulded copings articulate the elevation. An octagonal stair tower rises at the left junction of the gable, featuring small leaded casements and a pyramidal roof with projecting rafter feet and iron brackets. Short, single-storey wings with pitched roofs project diagonally at the angles, framing the gable end. The wing to the right (east) has a three-light mullioned window on the southern side, and within its gable is a stone-lined arched alcove containing a bust of George Cadbury on a square pedestal. The wing to the left (west) features a four-light mullioned and transomed window in its gable end.

The side elevations, facing roughly east and west, are four bays long. Each bay has a wide moulded segmental-arched recess within the brickwork, containing a timber mullion and transom window. Rafter feet line the eaves, and the roof has a two- or three-light hipped dormer to each bay.

Extensions, of lesser architectural interest, extend from the north gable, recessed from the building line and with lower, shallower pitched roofs. A 1960s rectangular extension with a pitched roof is set perpendicular to the main range, linked by a narrow flat-roofed section. A later, flat-roofed extension wraps around the north-west corner.

The original entrance leads into a tiled lobby, which also provides access to the stair tower and service rooms within the southern wings. The east wing contains Cadbury’s columbarium. The meeting hall is lined with matchboarding to the dado, with plain plaster above. A blind arch is present on the north gable end, and a gallery with a timber balustrade runs across the southern end. The meeting hall is a double-height space, well lit by large windows in the elevations and dormers in the roof. The roof structure consists of collar trusses supported on arched braces rising from the floor, two tiers of purlins, closely spaced rafters and beams at collar level, and a ceiling above.