Broomhill Pool

This is a lido complex featuring two swimming pools, constructed in 1938 and subject to some 20th-century alterations. Designed by the Ipswich Borough Surveyor's Department, the structure is built of reinforced concrete with flat roofs and exemplifies the Moderne style. The rectangular plan incorporates an entrance block angled to align with Sherrington Road. The entrance block is single-storey, extending over four windows, with small projecting wings at each end and a recessed central section formerly topped with a clock tower, which was removed in 1965. Steps lead to a triple-opening entrance screen, highlighted by a slightly raised roofline featuring a three-light metal window on either side and a two-light window within the wings. This window line is repeated around the building via a panel of channelled rustication. The rear elevation mirrors this design, with doors replacing windows in the recessed central section. Beyond the entrance area lies the pool surround, which is concave and canted, incorporating a three-stage canted planter originally designed as a water cascade. The children’s pool has a similarly canted end. The main pool, measuring 165 feet by 60 feet, features a sloping sunbathing area to one side and a stepped grandstand to the other. It includes a deep end suitable for water polo and a 15-foot deep diving pit. Original tubular steel four-stage diving boards remain in place. The grandstand provides seating for 700 people; the concrete seating was renewed in 1989. Behind the sunbathing area are changing cubicles, originally segregated by gender and primarily featuring individual cubicles; the roofs were renewed in 1966. A basket kiosk and service kiosk are present, each with metal-framed windows. A three-storey services building, incorporating toilets, rises from the centre of the grandstand, extending downwards to form the entrances to the former ladies' changing cubicles and the filtration plant area, which houses the original filtration tanks. An end wall with a continuous canopy tops the building, punctuated by a central refreshment kiosk with curving corner windows. Boundary walling has been renewed, and some sections have been replaced with metal balustrading. Broomhill Pool is a well-detailed and carefully integrated example of an urban lido, largely unaltered in its principal features. Its construction cost £17,000, significantly more than the cost of the since-demolished Pipers Vale lido, which had opened in the town the previous year.