Upavon Camp (Officers' Mess), Building 21

Officers' Mess, Upavon Camp (Building 21)

This Officers' Mess was built in 1914–15 to designs by the War Office's Directorate of Fortifications and Works, documented in drawings numbered 74/14 and 180/14. The building features scribed rendering on concrete block with some stone dressings and synthetic slate roofing installed during a re-roofing in 1996.

Plan and Layout

This is a highly complex formal composition designed to accommodate 80 officers. The main entrance is positioned centrally on the long north side, opening onto a short cross axis. Long lateral wings extend in two ranges with central open-ended courtyards. The site slopes steeply from north to south, and the predominantly single-storey building is arranged across two levels.

The near-symmetrical layout features an entrance vestibule and small dining room on the short axis. To the right are an ante-room and billiard room, separated from the long main dining room to the rear (south) by an extensive lounge that occupies a former open courtyard. To the left of the entrance are a ladies' room and bar at the front, with kitchen and service areas to the rear. Between these areas sits a two-storey conference suite and a deep open-ended courtyard. A narrow quarter-landing internal staircase rises to a single room above the small dining room, positioned on the building's short central axis.

Exterior

The building employs two principal window types: plain-glazed casements set flush to mullions and transoms serve the main suite of rooms, while glazing-bar sashes are used for the kitchen, service areas, and conference suite.

The entrance front displays eight bays to the left and six to the right of the emphasised central feature. This centrepiece has a coped gable on kneelers with weathered haunches over a small triple light with mullions beneath a stepped stone drip course. A panel is inscribed '1915 C R V'. Below stands a bold tetrastyle Roman Doric portico with flat entablature on a landing reached by nine broad steps. The portico shelters a central pair of ten-panel hardwood doors, each with four panels in leaded glazing, flanked by a small light on each side.

To the right of the entrance are two bold half-octagonal bays; to the left are three similar bays. Each has 1:3:1 lights to mullions and transom, though the furthest left bay has one large plain light centrally. This bay and its left neighbour have glazed escape doors on the splay returns. All bays feature a moulded cornice aligned with the box eaves to the principal roof and a high parapet that returns and sweeps down the roof slope. On each side of the central feature are two lights, with a further single light between projecting bays and at the outer ends. These are all two-light openings with mullion and transom. Stone sills are steeply weathered. A high plinth is marked by a very slight projection; at the left-hand end this is concealed by a later terrace. One ridge stack with capping sits between the two bays to the right.

The left return has a plain coped gable on corbelled kneelers above a plain wall, continued at a lower level to a flat-roofed addition that runs across the rear beneath two small clerestory lights. This faces a narrow open yard with a two-storey hipped block featuring four twelve-pane sashes at each level on each side, a cropped stack, and a doorway to the north. Beyond, to the left, is a low gabled storage building.

The right-hand return has a similar coped gable but with additional central kneelers to a slightly projected central section containing a two-light casement with mullion and transom. This continues flush with the link unit, which contains a pair of glazed doors and flanking two-light casements with built-in transom. The doors sit beneath a later open covered way, above which is a broad overlight. The straight coped parapet has a tall raised centre section. Beyond is the wide coped gable to the dining room, featuring a projecting hexagonal section under a hipped leaded roof, flanked by typical two-light casements.

The rear elevation reflects the complexity of the plan. A high central block on the short axis has a coped parapet on high kneelers with a very small window above a central pair of glazed doors with an eight-pane overlight, flanked by a plain sash on each side (each with a floating cornice) and with a stepped drip-course over the door. The opposite gable is similarly treated. Each gives onto a balcony with coped solid balustrade raised at the centre. On each side of this upper storey are two small sashes.

From the left are three projecting bays of the dining room; the innermost of these is brought forward and sits beneath a coped gable but is otherwise detailed as on the north side. Stepped forward from this, at a lower level, is a hipped range with four twelve-pane sashes, adjoining the higher gabled kitchen. The kitchen has a verge with bargeboard over a large sixteen-pane central sash flanked by a smaller twelve-pane sash to its left; the sill remains from the corresponding blocked light to the right. A small sash on the return adjoins a balancing hipped wing with a paired light (one in sixteen panes and the other reglazed with twelve), a further twelve-pane window and a small light, before a paired plank gateway to the service court. Beyond this is the gable to the storage building. The conference block is linked to the main building by a single-storey range. The high roof over the vestibule has two two-light dormers at differing levels facing into the courtyard to the east.

Interior

The main public rooms are richly detailed and on a grand scale. A small vestibule from the entrance doors leads through a revolving door to the main lobby, which is divided into two parts by an open screen of two Doric columns with responds. Each part has a segmental panelled ceiling and is panelled in polished oak to a height of approximately 1.7 metres with a deep three-part entablature including egg-and-dart cornice mould. The first section has a telephone booth on each side of the revolving door, a pair of painted panelled doors in hardwood architrave and entablature to the right, and a plain arch to a transverse corridor to the left. This part is lit by the triple light above the entrance door. The rear section, with roof lantern, has a pair of doors to the right identical to the other pair, and to the rear five marble steps lead to a cross passage. On each side of the opening are responds to the internal screen.

The ante-room, to the right, has a deep bay with polished hardwood seating. At the far end is a broad artificial stone 'Minster' fire surround to a projecting chimney breast, with a pair of painted panelled doors in deep-carved architrave to the left. There is a corresponding door at the entrance and, to the left, pairs of small-pane glazed doors in similar architraves. The room features a deep moulded skirting, a moulded picture rail about thirty centimetres above the door heads and broken forward above each of them, and a simply moulded cornice to the twelve-compartment ceiling to keep beams. The square billiard room beyond is similar, but the bay window seat is painted and there is a small fire opening with a later surround.

From this room a pair of part-glazed doors leads to the central lounge, which has a long central lay light beneath a segmental glazed rooflight. The south side has three doorways and four flat Doric pilasters rising from a tall moulded skirting to ceiling height. The long wall to the south side has two sets of five marble steps rising through deep recesses to paired part-glazed doors, with corresponding flat pilasters. A central brick fireplace of 1930s design is decorative only. The outer wall is mainly glazed, and the inner wall, adjoining the lobby, has part-glazed doors in architrave with entablature.

The dining room runs parallel with the lounge and is subdivided by a proscenium 'arch' with panelled pilasters. The first part, to the west, has a nine-compartment ceiling and a segmental arch through to the bay. To the right is a wide recess under a segmental arch, above which is 'Jacobean' panelling in pilasters. Flanking the doors from the lounge are deep square-headed recesses with glazed trophy cabinets; above these are two three-light clerestory windows. In the second part of the room are a further six compartments to the ceiling and, to the south, a deep recess to the projecting bay. The end wall has a wide chimney breast, now without fire opening, flanked by pairs of flush doors, and there is a further clerestory window on the inner wall.

The wing left of the lobby has the ladies' room with a six-compartment ceiling. The bay windows are without seating, and a simple dropped proscenium has a continuous curtain, giving onto the square space containing a late 20th-century bar. The corridor to the south of this unit has a high moulded skirting, two doors with moulded architraves and entablature, and a panelled ceiling. The service areas have been modified by necessary updating.

Historical Context

The Officers' Mess has been ingeniously planned and accommodated to the sloping site with a compact and functional layout. The view to the north from the portico was very extensive, across Salisbury Plain, but later tree planting has concealed this. A drawing dated June 1914 is ascribed to E W Ellison, Associate of the Royal Institute of British Architects.

The building has great historical importance as one of the key buildings relating to the development of military aviation in its formative years before the First World War. It was the finest building erected for the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) until its abolition in 1918. No survivals of this type relating to the pioneering years of aviation are known to have survived elsewhere in Europe or America.

Upavon comprises one of three sites around the Army training ground at Salisbury Plain that relate to the crucial formative phase in the development of military aviation in Europe prior to the First World War. The selection of Upavon was a direct result of the Committee for Imperial Defence's decision to unify the army and naval arms of British military aviation within one organisation. Opened in June 1912—one month after the formation of the Royal Flying Corps—Upavon was established as the Central Flying School (CFS) for the RFC under Captain Godfrey Paine RN. The temporary buildings of 1912 were replaced from 1913 as pupil numbers and the demand for improved accommodation rose. The CFS ran an advanced course for military purposes, as pilots had already completed the elementary stage before arriving here.

Upavon, like the nearby sites of Larkhill and Netheravon, offered an ideal hill-top position for military flying, close to the army training areas on Salisbury Plain. The first pilot's certificate issued at the end of the first training course was to Captain (Brevet Major) Hugh Trenchard, who by January 1918 had risen to the post of Assistant Commander at Upavon and went on to become the RAF's first Chief of Air Staff.

Upavon remained the Central Flying School until 1924, when its location at the core of the Wessex group led to its replacement by Wittering in Lincolnshire. This function was re-established after a brief period as a Fleet Air Arm shore base in 1935, by which time a large building programme was underway. It became a Flying Training School from 1942 to 1945 and a transport base from 1946. 38 Group was responsible for organising the Berlin Airlift from here.

The varied buildings reflect the complex history of the base, the most significant part of which is the domestic camp located on the north side of the A343. The precise direction of its future development as the Central Flying School was not planned at the outset, its construction in permanent fabric waiting for two years after its opening. The buildings of 1914 were all designed by the War Office's Directorate of Fortifications and Works, the most notable of these being the Officers' Mess (Building 21), the airmen's barracks and officers' quarters planned after those at Netheravon, and Buildings 68, 70, and 110.