Gateshead, Swinburne Street, Public Library

HER Number:
8291

District:
Gateshead

Site Name:
Gateshead, Swinburne Street, Public Library

Place:
Gateshead

Map Sheet:
NZ26SE

Class:
Education

Site Type: Broad:
Library

Site Type: Specific:
Public Library

General Period:
Early Modern

Specific Period:
C19

Form of Evidence:
Extant Building

Description:
The former Public Library. 1885 by John Johnstone. Ashlar in an extravagant neo- baroque style. Welsh slate roof. Two storeys and attic, five bays, the central bay projecting under a shaped, pedimented gable with round-arched attic windows. Flanking broken serpentine pediments have round windows, urn finials and carved swags. Urns rest on parapet at ends and between gables. Heavy entablatures to both floors, resting on end pilasters and (on first floor) paired pilasters between windows. Carved friezes. Flat arched first floor windows, the central tripartite and breaking the pediment of the entrance, which rests on two heavy carved brackets. Ground floor openings round arched with archivolts, key stones with masks and impost string; nook shafts to door. Ground floor rusticated with sunk apron panels. Included partly for group interest with the remaining municipal buildings on Swinburne Street-West Street. LISTED GRADE 2

Easting:
2550

Northing:
6341

Grid Reference:
NZ25506341

Lats/Lons:

Sources:
Department of National Heritage, List of Buildings of Special architectural or Historic Interest, 5/113; S. Taylor and D. Lover, 2004, Gateshead - Architecture in a Changing English Urban Landscape, p 29