The Public Library

The Public Library

The Public Library, also known as the City Library, stands on Pydar Street in Truro. It comprises two integrated buildings: a free library opened in 1896 and the Central Technical Schools for Cornwall, opened in 1899. Both were designed by Silvanus Trevail and donated by Passmore Edwards, who laid their foundation stones.

The buildings are constructed from local rubble with dressed local stone brought to course on the principal elevations, rock-faced granite plinths, and freestone dressings. The roofs are Delabole slate with coped gables, V-jointed clay ridge tiles, and dressed stone axial stacks over the cross walls. Original cast-iron gutters, rainwater heads and downpipes remain.

The original library follows a U-shaped plan with two cross wings flanking an entrance hall leading to a stair hall overlooking a small rear courtyard. The left-hand cross wing contains an axial passage and entrance hall behind the front room, with its doorway fronting onto Pydar Street. The technical school, built to the right, has a shallow E-shaped plan formed by cross wings breaking forward slightly, with a central entrance hall leading to a large stair hall. The overall style is an inventive mixture of Renaissance Classical and Domestic Gothic.

The library is two storeys plus attics; the technical school is three storeys. The exterior remains complete and unaltered, featuring original wooden sash windows sliding within stone transomed windows with stone mullions. Rear windows are transomed timber except for large stone stair windows with double transoms and coloured glass. The top lights of the library windows also contain coloured glass.

The principal south-east front is symmetrical, with the original library presenting 1:1:1-bays and the taller technical school 1:1:1:1:1-bays. Both have central doorways with other bays subdivided into groups of mullioned windows. The library has pairs of 2-light windows on the ground floor, round-arched tripartite windows above, and 2-light windows in the gables. Its round-arched doorway features an ironwork fanlight and 2-light window over, with panelled doors. A mid-floor stone fascia continues across the later school.

The technical school front is more elaborate, featuring Renaissance and Gothic-style detail: a central round-arched doorway with spoked fanlight set between pairs of rusticated pilasters in the manner of a Gibbs surround; flat-headed groups of three 2-light windows on the ground floor; round-arched blind arches above first-floor windows and basket-arched heads over second-floor windows. The projecting central and outer bays are surmounted by pedimented gables, while recessed bays have central 2-light gabled windows flanked by 3-light blind panels with traceried heads. The most striking feature is a frieze containing carved craftsmen over the first-floor windows of the central bay.

The Pydar Street south-west front of the library is irregular with 1:1:1-bays and similar detail to the other front. The ground floor of the entrance bay is slightly broken forward in the angle between the projecting left-hand bay and the remainder of this front. A Stokes Memorial appears in the frieze over the doorway. The gable-ended bay on the left has a 3-light bay window on the ground floor and a smaller canted bay window above.

The right-hand north-east elevation is symmetrical with three pairs of lights to the middle of each floor. The upper floor has stepped pairs of lights rising into a steep pedimented gable.

The interior is virtually complete and unaltered, retaining original doorways, doors and ceiling cornices. The original library contains an open-well stair with turned balusters, while the technical school has an open-well stair with an iron balustrade.

This is one of six libraries in Cornwall donated by Passmore Edwards; the technical school is the only example of its kind. Both parts represent some of the finest work by the noted Cornish architect Silvanus Trevail.