Description

ISLINGTON

TQ3086SW MANOR GARDENS 635-1/21/615 (South side) North Library and attached gate piers and railings

II

Public library, originally known as North Islington Library. 1905-6. By Henry T.Hare. Red and yellow brick set in English bond with dressings of Portland stone, and roof of slate. Three storeys over basement, seven-window range to main front, with lower porch wing of one-window range to right. Apart from the porch, the building is symmetrical with pedimented outer bays. Casement windows throughout with original leaded glazing. Round-arched entrance to porch consisting of pilasters and moulded stone archivolt with double keystone, set in a rectangular architrave with festoons in the spandrels; cornice with lettered panel to parapet 'PUBLIC LIBRARY'; the porch is cross-vaulted with a shallow domed apse to right and two flat-arched architraves with keystones facing the entrance, one for a door, the other for the foundation stone; first floor of porch wing set back with flat-arched window with moulded stone architrave and parapet with stone coping swept up to main block. This has a base of Portland stone; outer bays stepped forward twice with rainwater goods in re-entrant angle; keyed oculus to ground floor; storey band; flat-arched window to first floor with eared architrave and plain stone apron; flush stone quoins; modillion cornice to broken pediment with central cartouche and festoons; stepped parapet behind pediment. The centre of the building has, on the ground floor, a sequence of double brick Doric pilasters with stone courses supporting stone entablature with pulvinated frieze and dentil cornice; set back between the pilasters are five flat-arched windows with mullions and transoms and moulded stone architraves; the windows read as a continuous screen by comparison with the first floor which has five small flat-arched windows with eared architraves and festoons as aprons; the modillion cornice continues to the eaves; roof of graded slate with five dormers alternating between segmental and triangular pediments; central lantern with pediments to all four sides and ogee roof with delicate finial and weather vane. Stacks to apex of stone-coped gables, with stone courses and cornice. Rear apsidal elevation of yellow brick with red brick dressings and shallow buttresses. Brick gate piers in front of porch with stone caps; area railings with urn standards and spike finials. INTERIOR: : entrance hall panelled in fine grey stone, terrazzo floor, ceiling barrel-vaulted in the centre and cross-vaulted at either end. Ground-floor front room, originally the children's library, has a coffered ceiling and dentil cornice; round-arched arcade, now unmoulded, to rear, apsidal room, formerly the reading room, which has a semi-circular arcade of four Doric columns and beams radiating to the outer walls. Staircase with dado of fine grey stone and dog-leg stair with stone balustrade to third flight and landing. First-floor passage with terrazzo floor and alternately cross- and barrel-vaulted ceiling; former lecture room to front with segmental vaulted ceiling panelled with decorative plasterwork; rear apsidal room, now, as originally, the lending library, with semi-circular arcade of four Corinthian columns. The elaborate wooden architraves to doors, some pedimented, with original panelled and glazed doors and original door furniture, survive generally throughout the building. (Amian L.Champneys: Public libraries: London: 1907-: P.130).

Listing NGR: TQ3030586287

External Links

• Wikidata Q26490251

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