Tyne and Wear HER(8013): Newcastle, Barras Bridge, Hancock Museum - Details
8013
Newcastle
Newcastle, Barras Bridge, Hancock Museum
Newcastle
NZ26NW
Education
Museum
Early Modern
C19
Extant Building
Museum. 1878 by John Wardle for the Newcastle Natural History Society. Sandstone ashlar with plinth. Greek Revival style. Two storeys. Wide stone steps up to terrace with five double doors and overlights. Plain stone reveals to doors and to wood mullioned and transomed windows in end bays and on first floor. Square Doric attached columns. Entablature and parapet with raised panels over projecting wings and over central low relief THE HANCOCK MUSEUM on fascia. Square piers flanking lowest steps have cast iron urn-shaped supports to square gas lamps. Pevsner adds that "it is unbelievably Dobsonian for that date, with Dobson's beautiful ashlar, his Doric pilasters and heavy attic, and even the sans-serif capital letters of the pre-Victorian nineteenth century". The museum was named after renowned local naturalists John (d.1890) and Albany Hancock. Lord Armstrong made a generous contribution to its cost, and his statue now stands outside it (HER 5179). LISTED GRADE 2*
2485
6516
NZ24856516
Department of National Heritage, List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest, 14/83; N. Pevsner and I. Richmond, second edition revised by G. McCombie, P. Ryder and H. Welfare, 1992, The Buildings of England - Northumberland, p 452; Grace McCombie, 2009, Newcastle and Gateshead - Pevsner Architectural Guide, p. 23; Malcolm L Scaife, 1974, Newcastle Old and New