Hampshire Archives and Local Studies, Winchester, Hampshire

Summary

Public Record Office built 1991-1993 to the designs of the Hampshire County Architect’s Department, under the county architect Sir Colin Stansfield Smith.

Description

Public Record Office built 1991-1993 to the designs of the Hampshire County Architect’s Department, under the county architect Sir Colin Stansfield Smith.

MATERIALS: a steel- and concrete-framed building with walls of local Michelmersh bricks laid in English bond and Soldier bond with stone dressings, full glazing to the south-west elevation and whole second storey. The steel sawtooth roof is covered with lead sheet.

PLAN: the building is triangular on plan, oriented north-south, with the southern and western ends squared off and a triangular walled garden to the west. The ground-floor public search room, looking out into the garden, is placed centrally, flanked by east and north wings containing the strong-rooms. The building stands on a steeply-sloping corner plot at the junction of Sussex Street and Station Hill, meaning that the basement is exposed to the north and east.

EXTERIOR: the main entrance is in the ground floor of the three-storey south elevation at the narrowest part of the building. It is roofed by the first-floor terrace above, deep eaves carried on piloti providing shelter for the central revolving glass door flanked by single leaf doors to left and right. The rest of the elevation is composed of the fully-glazed southern ends of the first and second storeys, each set back to the north behind railed terraces. The upper storey includes two pairs of double leaf doors opening to its terrace below the south-facing pitch of the broad sawtooth roof.

The north and east elevations comprise red Michelmersh brick walling to the basement, ground- and first-floor storeys with a plinth in Soldier bond and upper walls in English bond, coped in stone. The basement levels include small rectangular openings filled with grilles which are nonetheless not expressed internally. Regularly placed, deep-set, small rectangular and square window openings with pale stone dressings in the ground- and first-floor levels respectively are glazed, but internally are blind except for those lighting the staff room to the north-west corner of the first floor. A horizontal line of cavity vents comprising alternate missing headers runs along the fourth course below the stone coping.

The east elevation of seven bays is raked from south to north. The first three bays follow the line upward of the building’s internal straight main stair marking the junction of the lower brick and upper glazed areas; the stone coping to the brickwork mirrors the interior stair. A door at pavement level in the third bay gives access to the basement. There are four ground floor and 12 first floor window openings to the four northern bays. The foundation stone is in the plinth of the northern-most bay. The north elevation of six bays includes five ground floor and 12 first floor window openings. The top storey below the steel sawtooth roof is fully glazed. The short, west elevation of two bays sees a continuation of the coped brick walling with fully glazed top storey. It includes further small rectangular openings closed by grilles in the ground and first floors, the line of cavity vents and one rectangular and three square window openings to the first floor. The ground floor staff entrance is in the southern bay, sheltered by the deep eave of the first-floor terrace above.

The rear south-west elevation comprises three terraced stories. It is fully glazed on all floors, apart from a short length of brickwork to the first floor returning from the west elevation that includes a single leaf door opening to the first floor terrace. The fully glazed ground floor faces into the garden, separated from the lawn by a patio where originally there was a shallow rectangular pool. The patio, paved with square concrete slabs, is sheltered by the deep eave of the terrace above. The railed first- and second-floor terraces are carried on broad white piloti, to which are fixed slender rain-water down pipes. Each terrace is paved with square concrete slabs. The deep eave of the second floor terrace shelters the first floor terrace below. The eaves are faced with pale white stone. Each level is linked to one another and to the garden by paired exterior steel staircases running parallel to the elevation. The two northern-most bays of the top storey extend the full east-west width of the building, whilst the three bays to the south decrease in length as the building narrows. The effect is to off-set the west-facing gables in a zig-zag pattern. Double leaf doors in the south-facing wall of each bay provide access to the second floor terrace.

Deep rakes to both east and west sides of the sawtooth roof provide shading to the second floor offices, supplemented by rectilinear metal-framed brise-soleil fixed horizontally to the south- and north-facing eaves. Railings and a walkway have more recently been added to the roof as safety measures. Throughout, the metal window and door frames are black whilst the exterior stairs, handrails, railings, brise-soleil and roof struts are white. The railings to the terraces and roof include support posts, tubular handrails and wire horizontal rails. Original lamps stand at regular intervals on the terraces.

INTERIOR: the glazed foyer accessed from the main entrance houses the reception area, lit by large circular lights recessed into the concrete ceiling. It is single-height at the front, becoming full-height at the rear of the space. Access to the search room is to the left via four glazed single leaf doors between brick piers. The main staircase on the east wall leads to the upper floors with access below to the basement. The locker-room, public toilets and lift are accessed through an opening in the north wall, on which is mounted the plaque unveiled by The Queen during the building’s opening ceremony.

The ground-floor search room is fully-glazed to the west, with brick walls on the north and east sides. Two double leaf doors open into the garden to the west, whilst shelving units obscure the interior walls. The area alongside the west wall is single height, the rest of the search room is double-height lit by the glazing to the first floor terrace. The white-painted concrete ceiling, into which is let large circular lights placed regularly in recesses, is carried on broad white-painted pillars with one central pillar in the double-height space carrying rain-water from the roof. A glazed former door opening in the first floor level of the east wall was linked to the search room by a staircase that was removed some years ago. Much of the furniture, including the map desk, is original in battleship grey, with some original chairs in bent plywood with tubular metal frames and black upholstery. The central enquiries desk* is a recent addition.

The search room’s brick north wall includes a stone string course above which are original mirrored panels. A single leaf door with a porthole window leads into the document production area, from which a heavy metal door to the right leads into the Level 2 (ground-floor) strong-rooms. A door to the left gives access to the second stair, lift, fully-glazed double leaf door staff entrance and a suite of rooms including the document reception area and rooms for cleaning documents that arrive in different conditions. The single leaf office doors have porthole windows and the rooms include original furniture and storage units in battleship grey.

The strong-rooms in the basement, ground- and first-floors are arranged in an L-plan in the east and north wings of the building. Each is accessed via heavy metal doors throughout and contain original mobile roller-racking and metal shelving units, comprising some 8 miles of storage space. Non-original air-handling units* have been introduced.

The basement includes the Level 1 strong-rooms, plant and other storage areas. The staircase from the entrance foyer leads down to a plant room and a group of box rooms and storage spaces, with a door in the north wall into the east wing’s strong-room. At the west end of the north wing is a second stair and lift and a group of box rooms including a caretaker’s room. An underground service area, paved with square concrete slabs and with steeply-angled cement rendering to the western and southern faces, runs alongside the wings on the south and west sides; it is reached through the southern plant room and by a door next to the second stair.

Public access to the first floor is by the main staircase from the entrance foyer and adjacent lift. A small education room to the left is fully glazed on its west side including double leaf doors that open onto the first-floor terrace. The glazing includes the former door opening servicing the internal staircase that used to link to the search-room. A heavy metal door in the education room’s north wall leads directly into the Level 3 (first-floor) strong-rooms for easy access to archive material. There is a small office to the right. Staff-only access to the first floor is via the second stair and lift in the west end of the north wing: on that landing are a single leaf door to the first floor terrace, the staff toilets (which have always been gender-neutral), shower, a cleaners’ cupboard and the staff room. Although the walls are re-painted, the staff room seating and kitchen units are original. The glazed window openings to the north and west walls light the staff room, with small circular lights in the suspended ceiling. Throughout, the interior single leaf office doors have porthole windows.

The second floor, open to the roof, provides a mix of public and staff spaces. The sawtooth roof has steel ridge beams and purlins, circular in section, with open trusses linked at principal points by narrower tubular bracing beams forming a regular web pattern. The fully-glazed floor is lit naturally, including roof lights in the northern-most pitch of the sawtooth roof, and with artificial lighting in individual office spaces. Blinds to the glazed panels can be operated manually or automatically. The main staircase leads to a landing extending most of the east side of the building, with long-distance views over the city to the hills beyond through the fully-glazed wall. From the landing, the public lift, common room (with original furniture, sinks and cupboards) and WC fill the short southern-most bay of the five top-storey bays. Next, the Wessex Film and Sound Archive office includes a range of equipment such as reel-to-reel film editing consoles and original battleship grey office furniture. The cinema alongside is accessed from the landing via a pair of double leaf doors that open into small lobbies with single leaf doors into the cinema. The cinema space is defined by demountable partition walls with its screen on the east wall, flanked by the entrances, facing the original raked seating (re-upholstered) with a small projection room to the west and an office behind. The upper parts of the cinema’s partition walls closing the roof space are filled with mirrored glass.

The fourth and fifth bays to the north provide one large space divided into discrete working areas by fully glazed interior walls and arrangements of original battleship grey office furniture and storage units. A southern landing runs alongside a group of five single-height enclosed cubicle offices oriented east-west; each office space has double leaf sliding glass doors on the north side and a single leaf door with a porthole window to the south. To the west are further staff desks with overhead storage and cupboards, the second stair and a fully-enclosed darkroom, which includes its original furniture and facilities for wet film processing. The fifth bay includes an enclosed office at the eastern end, then, moving west, staff spaces with desks and storage in areas defined by ranks of cupboards and shelving. Then the dry conservation area includes a number of large original desks and work benches, shelving, storage cupboards and other equipment and the original map wall. Behind that is the wet conservation space including an original large work bench, fume cabinet and other equipment.

SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: the slightly sunken, triangular, garden is enclosed by a high brick wall laid to English bond, coped with pale stone, with regularly spaced piers carrying wall lights. To the north-east and south-west corners the piers form pergolas enclosed by panels of vertical railings, forming a cloister effect. The garden includes a footpath paved with square concrete slabs surrounding the lawn, the sculpture ‘Mother and child’* by Glyn Williams (1990) and simple stone memorial benches* (introduced more recently) commemorating Lord Denning (1899-1999) and Charlotte Bonham Carter (1893-1989). There is a combination of covered and open spaces for plant behind the garden wall, over which a stairway and raised, partially-walled, path provide access around the western side of the Record Office with further steps into an adjacent car-park. The steps and path are paved with square concrete slabs.

* Pursuant to s1 (5A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas Act 1990 (‘the Act’) it is declared that these aforementioned features, along with the plant both in the building and the external units at the garden boundary, are 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 listed building consent and this is a matter for the local planning authority to determine.

History

During the C18 and C19, Hampshire’s muniments had been housed in various public buildings including the Assize court. Hampshire County Council opened a dedicated Record Office in 1947, managed by county archivist Eleanor Cottrill, in a former bank on the High Street, Winchester. The volume of acquisitions required that the collection be moved, first to the basement of the council’s buildings on Castle Avenue and then to the new Elizabeth II Court in 1959. During the 1970s the redundant Church of St Thomas was converted into a new Record Office but the premises became too small for the growing collections, so the County Council decided in the 1980s to construct a purpose-built archive and library. A derelict site, close to the line of the medieval city walls, was chosen for its proximity to the city railway station and other public transport.

In the later-C20, purpose-built facilities were being preferred for UK record offices, influenced by The National Archives newly-built at Kew. Another strong influence was the high thermal inertia building technique pioneered by the Deutsches Bundesarchiv (Koblenz, Germany), providing passive environmental control of strong-rooms, although that was not universally-adopted in the UK. Hampshire Archive and Local Studies nevertheless exemplifies these two major trends.

The County Council Architect’s Department, led by the county architect Sir Colin Stansfield Smith (1932-2013), collaborated in the design process with county archivist Rosemary Dunhill and other staff, including Elizabeth Hughes. Stansfield Smith (1932-2013) had worked at the London County Council and in private practice before moving to Hampshire County Council in 1974. There he developed the Department to deliver a noted public building programme, often addressing issues such as energy conservation through design. Successful school designs include Bosmere Junior School (1982-1983) and Springwood Junior School (1981-1982) (both Grade II-listed) and Chandler’s Ford Library (1981-1982, Grade II). He was awarded the RIBA gold medal in 1991.

The new Record Office was amongst the first of a number of large-budget public schemes by Stansfield Smith’s ‘studio’ of design architects in the Department. The project architects were Stephen Clow, a recent graduate of the Mackintosh School of Architecture, and David Morriss who worked for Hampshire County Council from 1983 to 1996. They were assisted by Colin Jackson and Julian Gitsham. Morriss would go on to design the Berkshire Record Office, commissioned by Elizabeth Hughes, the Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre in Chippenham and other archives buildings internationally. The engineer was R.J. Watkinson and construction was by Wates Construction.

The three-fold brief included to respect the adjacent Conservation Area; to meet the needs of the archive service and its users; and to use ‘as little as possible of the earth’s depleting natural resources’ (HPUB/HR3/3, p2). Positioned as it was near the former city walls, Stansfield Smith envisaged the building as a bastion permitting access to Winchester, the east staircase embodying a way up to the ‘ramparts’ of the street-facing walls. He suggested the western walled garden to provide security, retaining the public footpath around the outside. The intention was to link past and present through the combination of traditional brick walling dramatically contrasted with steel and glass construction. A passively controlled storage environment for archive materials would be balanced by naturally light-filled working areas for staff and visitors. The Architectural Review (1993, 50) compared the arrangement of rectilinear openings in the brick walling to Aldo Rossi’s ossuary at San Cataldo, Modena (Italy) (1971).

The plans were drawn up in January 1991. Small revisions were made in the following month following which the construction project went out to tender. Wates Construction bid £4.4 millions and the final contract was signed on 27 January 1992. Lt Colonel Sir James Scott, the Lord Lieutenant of Hampshire, council leader Freddie Emery-Wallis Hon FRIBA, council chairman RC Millard, Sir Colin Stansfield Smith and Rosemary Dunhill laid the foundation stone on 17 March 1992. The building was completed in June 1993 and formally opened by The Queen on 19 November 1993. During the visit, Stansfield Smith showed the royal party a model of the building (currently [2022] on display in Elizabeth II Court); Prince Philip commented on how the building resembled a cruise liner. The Queen unveiled a wall plaque on display in the main entrance, before touring the building.

Hampshire Archives and Local Studies was awarded a RIBA Southern Region award in 1994. It was listed as part of Historic England’s celebration of The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee in 2022. Along with many other sites on the National Heritage List for England, it highlights the important social, technical and cultural changes that have accompanied Her Majesty’s reign.

Reasons for Listing

Hampshire Archives and Local Studies (1991-1993), designed by Sir Colin Stansfield Smith, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

Architectural interest:

* as a well-designed example of a purpose-built post-war archive repository by the noted Hampshire County Council Architect’s Department led by celebrated architect Sir Colin Stansfield Smith;
* for the use of sympathetic and good quality materials creating a rich texture, linking past and present through the combination of traditional brick elevations effectively juxtaposed with steel and glass construction;
* for the high degree of survival of its character, its plan form and interiors as built.

Historic interest:

* as an important example of late-C20 design theory and practice for archive repositories, including being one of the earliest to adopt high thermal inertia principles.

Group value:

* with the nearby remains of north-west corner of City Wall (Grade II-listed) and scheduled Winchester City Wall with associated monuments.

External Links

Historic England Listing

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