Details
LEEDS
SE3133 YORK ROAD
714-1/36/463 (South side)
09/03/87 Former York Road Library and Baths
II
Public library and baths entrance. 1903. By HA Chapman for
Leeds City Council. Ashlar and brick in English and English
garden wall bonds, graduated Welsh slate roof. Baroque Revival
style. 2 and 3 storeys.
Main elevation to York Road of 10 disparate bays: ashlar
ground floor, dressings, parapets and gables and moulded
coping; brick 1st floor; plinth. From left: 3-storeyed bay 1
has round-arched entrance to baths with decorative iron gates,
keyed moulded archivolt and plastered over-panel bearing words
PUBLIC BATHS; above it an oriel, and to left on these floors a
corniced 1-light window; 4-light 2nd-floor window; segmentally
gabled parapet with decorative motif.
Narrower, projecting bay 2 also of 3 storeys, has double
6-panel door under corbelled cornice on which is set an oculus
with console bracketed and corniced architrave; 1st-floor band
and corniced 2-light window; narrow 2nd-floor windows flanking
projecting clock carried on console bracket; above this rises
short circular tower, flanked by pilasters, having continuous
wood-mullioned windows and leaded ogee roof with finial.
Next 6 bays are 2-storey, arranged 3:3 under 2 gables: on
ground floor, double transomed 2-light, keyed and pedimented
windows, the right bays having in place of lower part of
central window the round-arch entrance with 6-panel double
door, original bronze handles, pilasters supporting corniced
segmental pediment and console-bracketed over panel bearing
words PUBLIC LIBRARY; the windows either side, in place of
central lights, have panels decorated with shields bearing
authors' names: Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton and Macauley.
On 1st floor, each section has 1-light windows in Gibbs
surround flanking a Venetian window with Ionic colonnettes,
cornices, and Gibbs-style arches. Each gable has an arched
niche with keystone rising into a pediment.
2 right-hand bays: of 2 lower storeys, with 3-light windows to
ground floor, 2-light windows above in Gibbs surrounds and
flanked by pilasters which rise into and above corniced
parapet; 2-span roof with corniced stacks at right end.
Rear: plainer, in brick, with opposing gabled sections, that
on left having Venetian-style window, that on right having
arched 1st-floor window flanked by flat-headed windows with
double-transomed 2-light windows below.
INTERIOR: good contemporary interior to library section
including: old floor-mosaic and decorative frieze to lobby;
wooden doors with side lights and fanlights having leaded
glazing and stained glass; richly treated architraves, those
in lobby with Ionic-style columns and decorative arches; in
library wall tiles, some patterned, cast-iron gallery with
decorative brackets, coffered ceiling.
The architect also designed Nos 9 & 11 Duncan Street (qv).
This building was illustrated and described in The Building
News for 9 May 1902: 'The ground floor of the library
comprises a lending department, news room, and ladies' room.
On the first floor will be the librarian's room, boys' and
girls' reading rooms, etc...' The swimming pool was approx 23m
long and there were also Russian, ladies' and gents' baths
supplied.
Listing NGR: SE3170533616
