North City

DETAILS

Client:
The Manchester College

Location:
Manchester, UK

BRIEF

The brief for the project, located in north Manchester, was to convert a derelict Grade II Listed Victorian Baths for specialist further education and community use. The building was in a significantly poor condition with areas exposed to the elements and having suffered fire damage over a 10 year period of dereliction. 

The case for restoration of the building and its incorporation as a second phase of the North Manchester Sixth Form College and Public Library site was strong; the urban block could be completed as a place of learning and community benefit. There followed a series of detailed discussions with the client, planning and heritage bodies to determine a way forward. 

From these discussions a programme of retention, restoration and refurbishment of the building was developed, with selective demolition and new building works sympathetic to the massing of the original. 

The original Baths entrance block has been fully restored including plaster and lath ceilings, ceramic tiling, timber doors and architraves, and a range of unique stain glass incorporating Manchester motifs. 

A new link bridge was formed to connect the two phases together. A new 3 storey teaching block has been inserted into the original building form using an insitu concrete frame along with complete replacement of the roof glazing lanterns and high insulation to the re-laid roofs. Imperial facing bricks with lime mortar coursing replaced the spalling brickwork to the pools. 

The result is a building retained and integrated into the context of the college campus, blending old and new and securing its long term future.