The Harris

The Harris Library and Museum is the cultural hub of Preston - it says so on the website!

It is named after  Edmund Robert Harris, a Preston lawyer, who left in his will £300,000 towards the building of a library in 1877. Building started in 1882 - the year of the Preston Guild - until 1893. A temporary library had operated from 1879.

It re-opened on Sunday after being closed for refurbishment for four years, so this seemed a good time to pay a visit.

It was built in a neo-classic style, with imposing columns at the front.


The style continues inside, with a rotunda similarly supported by columns.


The central open area extends four stories up, and they are each tall stories. The space is occupied by a pendulum, which is set swinging at regular intervals. Because of the way the planet is spinning, the swing of the pendulum slowing turns.

In the photo the pendulum weight is visible towards the bottom and just right of centre.

The building has a number of permanent features that bring the exotic to Preston.  for example, this door is a facsimile of one on a chapel in Florence.


The first floor, looking over the rotunda.


The reading room is on the right side, with a museum on the other. This is the reading room.


The museum on this floor is about Preston history.

This is the second floor.


Looking up at the third floor. Not sure if there is public access; not that I spotted anyway.


The second floor has an art gallery on the right side, and museum for visiting exhibitions on the other. This is the art gallery.


The current exhibition is Wallace and Gromit, celebrating Preston-born Nick Park. These are the actual sets from the movie Vengeance Most Fowl.




Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Caton and Halton

Image
This was a great walk between two small towns on the River Lune, just a few miles east of Lancaster. We started from across the river from Halton; there is a free car park near the old station. Th station is very well preserved. There is a sign on it for Lancaster University, and I assume it belongs to them, possibly as a boat house. Behind the station is the River Lune, and a bridge to the town of Halton. Back when the railway was built in 1849, this probably seemed a marvel - a railway just a bridge away! A century later, not so much. The railway was built by the North Western Railway, on its line from Skipton to Lancaster, which, together with the Morecambe Harbour and Railway Company, provided a link from Yorkshire to the port in the new town of Morecambe. The line closed in 1966, and is now a cycle path, which provides a nice walk. A gentle slope but surprisingly steep for a railway. The path runs along the river, and an old mill can be seen on the other side. At the top, some...
Read more

Bacup

Image
So soon after I visited Colne, I found myself comparing the two, and to be honest Colne wins; it felt more "happening" and lively, while Bacup had three buildings in such a poor state they had no roof - a lot for such a small place. And while Colne had some odd parkig rules, it did have plety of parking. Bacup has two small car parks (from Google), no signs to indicate where they are. Where Bacup did win was traffic. Being at the end of the M65, Colne has a lot of traffic. I visited Bacup on a Wednesday afternoon, and the roads were surprisingly quiet. The centre is where the A681 from Rochdale to Burnley crosses the A671 from Rawtenstall to Todmorden. Bacup is, of course, another mill town that flourished in Victorian times, and the town architecture reflects that, but as you can see in the image above is does have some Art Deco buildings. I like that the current business has embraced the style and the shop sign is also in an Art Deco style. The fine building on the left was...
Read more

Moor Lane and Lancaster Road North

Image
Moor Lane is a fairly short road that runs from the university at the north end of Friargate to the A6, where North Road becomes Garstang Road. It takes its name from Preston Moor, of which Moor Park is the last remnant. We start with the Adelphi, a pub I have probably mentioned before, which is next door to the new University building. It shares its name with a side street, and seems to date from 1838. Across Adelphi Street, this building was clearly a bank at one time! While this was clearly a church, more specifically a United Methodist Church. I found a couple of images of it on Flickr ( this from 1900), both claiming it as destroyed by fire in 2012. Moor Lane passes over the old railway to Longridge, but there is not much to see as it is in a tunnel. Then, set back a bit on the east side is Preston's last remaining windmill . Built in 1760, it was used as a windmill until 1880, but had other uses since then. It is now Grade II listed. This is the Queen Vic fish and chip shop,...
Read more