Main School Buildings At St Edmund'S College (Rc)

Old Hall Green TL 32 SE STANDON CAMBRIDGE ROAD (west side)

1/6 Main School Buildings at St Edmund's College (RC) (formerly listed as Douglass House 24.1.67 under St Bdmum's R.C College, Old Ball Green) II

GV

College. Main block 1795-9, refectory building 1805, both by James Taylor of Islington for the new St Edmund's College formed in 1793 by the amalgamation of the Old Hall Green Academy (RC) with the refugees from the famous English College at Douai founded in 1568. John Sone (d. 1795) gave 10,000 pounds for the New College at 'Old Hall as was heretofore at Doway College'. Low wings c1845 for former chapel to N, and library to S linking to refectory. Yellowish grey brick with stone plinth and 1st floor band. Hipped slate roofs. Darker grey brick refectory and dark red brick low wings. A severe symmetrical building of 3 storeys and attics, 15 windows long, facing E. The projecting 3 windows centre carries a dentilled pediment with oculus and is fronted by a C19 3-bay arched brick portico with glass roof. Composite pilasters and a cornice with 4 balls on pedestals. Similar balls on pedestals in the pierced brick parapet above the dentilled cornice to the main block.

The block is further articulated by the 3 round headed sash windows of the ground floor at each end being set a round headed panels having keystones and alternate voussoirs of vermiculated Coade stone rustication matching the three openings of the centre. The upper floors have recessed sash windows with segmental arches but the central window and the penultimate window at each end have also heavy moulded surrounds. Plainer W elevation of 3 storeys and attics with a central pediment with clockface crowned by a cupola, and projecting rear wings leaving a 9 window frontage. Low wing on N of a high single-storey, 4 windows long with steep slate roof behind a high parapet. Gothick style with 3-light mullioned windows with labels. Matching S wing raised to 2 storeys with similar windows. Refectory at right angles to W front adjoining S wing of 2 storeys and attics with a lofty ground floor partly sunken. 6 sash windows with round headed windows below the stone floor-band and segmental headed windows above with 6/6 panes. The rear half of the whole ground floor of the original block is occupied by a stone-floored circulation space or ambulacrum with a procession of painted medieval figures to designs said to be by Fuhrich of Vienna. The building of the college was an enterprise comparable in scale only with college work at Oxford and Cambridge, but far exceeding what English public schools did at that time (Pevsner (1977) 266- 7).

Listing NGR: TL3716522073