Elephant and Giraffe House at Bristol Zoo, Clifton, City of Bristol

Summary

Elephant and Giraffe House. Built in 1872 in a Tudor Gothic Revival style, and attributed to the architect Charles Hansom. Both the 1964 brick extension to the north and the C21 gorilla enclosure inserted into the interior are excluded from the listing.

Description

Elephant and Giraffe House. Built in 1872, and attributed to the architect Charles Hansom. Both the 1964 brick extension to the north and the C21 gorilla enclosure inserted into the interior are excluded from the listing.

MATERIALS: constructed of randomly coursed Brandon Hill Grit rubble stone with limestone dressings. The roof is covered in alternating bands of plain and scalloped clay tiles.

PLAN: much altered, although the original through passage plan from west to east, with enclosures to the south side is legible in the external detailing.

EXTERIOR: built in a Tudor Gothic Revival style, the façades of the building are articulated as a two-storey building with attic, beneath a cross-gabled roof with overhanging eaves. The west elevation comprises a paired gable arrangement, each with an attic window, two windows to the first floor, and a tall doorway to the ground floor. The wider doorway to the left-hand bay forms the entrance to the through passage with an opposing doorway to the east elevation. The east elevation has a pair of half dormers rather than gables, and a taking-in door at attic level of the right-hand bay. The south elevation reflects the original division of the animal house. The wide left-hand bay has a central wide doorway for the elephant, with a window above, and triangular roof dormers with trefoil shaped lights to the pitched roof. The right-hand gabled bay has a two-storey doorway for the giraffe with a paired window above.

The gabled and pitched roof of the north elevation is extant but the wall beneath has been removed to accommodate later extension.

INTERIOR: much altered.

Pursuant to s1 (5A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 (‘the Act’) it is declared that the C21 gorilla enclosure inserted into the interior of the building is not of special architectural or historic interest, however any works which have the potential to affect the character of the listed building as a building of special architectural or historic interest may still require LBC and this is a matter for the LPA to determine.

History

Bristol Zoological Gardens opened on the 11 July 1836, becoming the second zoological garden to open in England, after London Zoo in Regents Park (1828), and the fifth in Europe; the others being Schönbrunn Zoo in Vienna (1752), the Jardin des Plantes in Paris (1800), and Dublin Zoo (1831). Many more were to follow, illustrating the rapid and extensive establishment of zoological gardens, alongside other C19 cultural institutions such as museums and galleries, that were being built in England and across Europe to exhibit and study the exotic animal, plant, and cultural specimens that were being provided by empire and colonisation.

Bristol Zoological Gardens was founded by The Bristol, Clifton, and West of England Zoological Society that was formed in 1835 with the intention of creating a zoo for the purposes of both education and entertainment. The society raised the funds for their venture through the sale of shares, with many prominent Bristolians, such as Isambard Kingdom Brunel, William Goldney, and members of the Frys, Wills and Sturges families, being among the first shareholders. They were subsequently able to purchase 12 acres of land to the north of the suburb of Clifton on the outskirts of Bristol.

The design for Bristol Zoological Gardens was produced by Richard Forrest. A landscape designer and nurseryman, Forrest, was well-respected in his field and during his career worked on several important commissions including the gardens at Syon House, London, and Eaton Hall, Cheshire, as well as producing designs for several other zoological gardens. As with all early examples of zoological gardens, the design for Bristol was much influenced by the C18 landscaped gardens of the aristocracy, and this can be seen in Forrest’s scheme that retained many of the existing mature trees, but also including the planting of specimen trees and plants, the excavation of a lake to the centre, the creation of a Grand Terrace for promenading, as well as buildings in a characteristic pavilion style. Comparison of Forrest’s plan with George Ashmead’s map of 1853, alongside knowledge of the financial restrictions of the project, suggest that Forrest’s plans were not fully implemented. Ashmead’s map shows a simplified version of Forrest’s scheme with the animal enclosures concentrated to the north of the Grand Terrace, with most of the site being given over to gardens. This would seem to reflect both the difficulty in meeting management costs and that the botanical rather than the animal attractions were the initial draw for visitors. To increase revenue, the site was increasingly hired out for events, becoming a place not only to enjoy the plants and animals, but also a place of entertainment.

From the mid-1850s the surrounding land was developed for housing, and in 1862 the first buildings of Clifton College, located to the immediate south, were built. This development and the later Bank Holiday Act of 1871 led to an increase in visitor numbers leading to extensive changes to the zoo with a clear focus on public entertainment. The new animal enclosures added at this time, such as the elephant and giraffe house, and the polar bear enclosure that abutted its north elevation, were built in domestic styles and reflected the then architectural trend to place foreign wildlife into an English domestic setting.

In the early C20 the zoo suffered a period of stagnation, and the standard of the site declined. However, from 1925, the influence of Dr Richard Clarke, as director of the society, began to steer the zoo towards the promotion of knowledge through the quality of the botanical and animal specimens, and away from the pleasure ground aspect of the site. He proposed that 'every year a new feature should be built and shewn annually' to attract increased visitor numbers. He consequently ushered in a new profitability and animal focused philosophy, with the new buildings in modern and interesting settings. These new buildings were often designed under his guidance, with some showing the influence of Carl Hagenbeck’s zoo at Tierpark, Stellingen, near Hamburg (1906), and his ideas for the presentation of animals in their “natural” habitat, with the creation of panoramas, artificial rock formations, and the removal of cages. The Monkey Temple (1928) and the polar bear enclosure (1935) were particular examples of this approach at Bristol Zoo.

Further changes occurred throughout the C20 and C21, with a move to more hygienic enclosures with tiled surfaces, to increasingly natural environments as animal welfare and conservation became central to the zoo’s philosophy.

The elephant and giraffe house was built in 1872 in a Tudor Gothic Revival style. The interior was arranged as a through passage with two square animal enclosures, one for elephants and one for giraffes, that gave onto a paddock to the south side of the building. Its design has been attributed to the architect Charles Hansom who designed several villas in Bristol in a similar architectural style with cross-gabled roof plans, as well as the principal buildings of the neighbouring Clifton College.

In the late C19 an open-air Gothic-style polar bear enclosure was attached to the north elevation. This was demolished in about 1935 and replaced with a brick extension designed by CFW Dening to provide a separate Elephant House; the original building was given over to giraffes. Dening’s extension was replaced in 1964 with a larger brick building that incorporated a mural of a herd of elephants to its canted north façade. In the mid-1990s this extension was converted into a gorilla house, and in 2013 the former elephant and giraffe house was incorporated and a glazed and metal-framed gorilla enclosure inserted into the interior.

Reasons for Listing

The elephant and giraffe house, attributed to the architect Charles Hansom, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* as an animal enclosure built in a Tudor Gothic Revival style that reflects the mid-C19 trend to house exotic animals in an English domestic-style building;
* for its careful scale and massing, with the oversized doors to the south elevation providing the only hint of its former occupants;
* for its construction in the local Brandon Hill grit giving it a locally distinctive architectural character;
* for the good degree of overall external survival despite later alterations and extensions.

Historic interest:

* built in the mid-C19, it is a relatively early and rare surviving example of a mid-C19 animal enclosure;
* for its illustration of mid-C19 ideas concerning the display of exotic animals and how this informs our understanding of changing architectural approaches and public attitudes to the housing of animals in captivity.

Group value:

* with the other listed buildings at Bristol Zoological Gardens.

External Links

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.