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Engineering Building, University of Leicester
Engineering Building, University of Leicester
	Engineering Building, October 2009
Alternative names	University of Leicester Engineering Building
General information
Status	Completed
Type	Teaching, research
Architectural style	Brutalism, Postmodernism
Location	Leicester, United Kingdom
Address	University Road, LE1 7RH
Coordinates	52°37′13.19″N 1°7′25.18″W / 52.6203306°N 1.1236611°W
Current tenants	University of Leicester
Construction started	1959
Completed	1963
Design and construction
Architect(s)	James Stirling, James Gowan
Structural engineer	Frank Newby

The Engineering Building is part of the University of Leicester. It was designed by the architects James Stirling and James Gowan.

The Red Trilogy

The building is part of the Red Trilogy by James Stirling. Beginning in the late 1950s, the architect designed three university buildings featuring distinctly red materials: red bricks and red tiles. The Red Trilogy includes the Engineering Building, University of Leicester (1959–1963), the Faculty of History, University of Cambridge (1964–1967), and the Florey Building, The Queen's College, Oxford (1966–1971). James Stirling and James Gowan worked together on the design for the Engineering Building. The Trilogy's two later buildings were designed by Stirling, without Gowan.

Design

The Engineering Building is a large and complex structure. Stirling and Gowan were tasked to design spaces for offices, laboratories, auditorium, and workshops with heavy machinery. The design also includes a water tank on top. The workshops are located in the low-rise section of the building, in a hall with a rectangular floor plan. Connected to the workshop hall is the tower, which houses auditorium, offices, and laboratories. The water tank sits on top of the tower. The tower section is notable for its chamfered edges and its prismatic geometry. The auditorium is located at the base of the tower. The auditoriums seating arrangement is designed typically stadium-like with staggered rows of seats. The angled auditorium floor results in a pronounced wedge-shape on the building's exterior.^[1] The tower's facades are clad in glass and red tiles, the workshop hall's facade is entirely made of frosted glass.

A unique feature of the workshop hall is its roof construction. The roof's geometry is rotated by 45 degrees in respect to the floor plan's orientation.^[2] This results in a unique jagged roof line and a diamond-pattern-like perimeter.^[3] The roof appears as a series of multiple translucent prisms. The translucent effect was achieved by lining the glass panes with fibre-glass. Other parts of the glass shell are completely opaque, in contrast. Here, the glass panes were coated with a thin layer of aluminium.^[4]

Stirling and Gowan were commissioned in 1957.^[5] The design is dated to 1959. Construction lasted from 1960 to 1963. The consulting structural engineer was Frank Newby.^[5]

Refurbishment

By 2013 the deterioration of the glazed facades in the Workshop blocks and low rise Block had got to a position that something had to be done; refurbishment of the facade, structure and associated building systems was now essential. Clearly the challenges around a necessary refurbishment were enormous. The building was at risk failing completely without a full fabric replacement, and it was always freezing cold in winter and unbearably hot in summer. The leaky single glazed steel framed glazing was replaced with English Heritage approval with aluminium framed double-glazed units. The internal HVAC systems had to be replaced almost like for like, but clever solutions were realised to turn the heating system (exposed pipe coils and ventilation fan units) into a changeover system with elevated chilled water in summer providing peak lop cooling. Work was undertaken by a large Contractor and Consultant supply chain working with the University of Leicester and English Heritage. The project was commenced in January 2016 and successfully completed by the end of 2017, saving the buildings unique architecture for many generations to come.^[6]

Recognition

The Red Trilogy in general, and the Engineering Building in particular, are recognized as turning points in the development of postwar modern architecture. James Stirling went beyond the paradigm of pure functionalism. The Engineering Building's color and geometry are more decorative than the typical 1950s and 1960s brutalist architecture. The three buildings of the Red Trilogy were designed consecutively. The Leicester Engineering Building first, the Cambridge History Faculty second, the Oxford Florey Building third. Their successive designs illustrate James Stirlings way towards postmodernist architecture. The designs are progresisvely more playful and decorative. The Engineering Building represents Stirling's first step from brutalism towards postmodernism. Therefore, the building is regarded as one of the origins of postmodern architecture.^[7] At the same time, the Engineering Building als is praised as one of Britains high points of brutalist architecture. Elain Harwoods book Space, Hope, and Brutalism features a photo of the Engineering Building's workshop hall on its cover. The building is a protected heritage site with a Grade 2 listing.^[5]

References

^ Team, ArchEyes (2020-01-20). "Engineering Building in Leicester / James Stirling & James Gowan". ArchEyes. Retrieved 2022-07-13. The engineers wanted a water tank for the ground floor hydraulics laboratory so, to create the required pressure, the tank was placed on top of the tower. Lecture rooms stick out at right angles, and the tower also houses laboratories and offices.
^ "Engineering Building by James Stirling at GreatBuildings". GreatBuildings. Retrieved 2022-07-13.
^ "Engineering building University of Leicester". www.arup.com. Retrieved 2022-07-13. The building was covered by a triangular trussed steel frame roof with distinctive diamond-shaped perimeter rooflights.
^ Jacobus, John (1963-04-11). "Engineering Building at Leicester University by Stirling and Gowan". Architectural Review. Retrieved 2022-07-13. The real turnabout in Leicester Engineering is the architects' spirited adoption of glass – glass as an opaque and translucent as well as a transparent medium. [...] Something similar happens with the glass that encloses and roofs the workshop areas. The north lights are indeed translucent, being of a ply-glass whose inner layer is fibre-glass. Much of the rest of this part of the building is dressed with opaque glass that has a coating of aluminium for its core. Except at night, when the real lights glow from the artificial illumination of the interior spaces, the distinction between real and blind glass cannot be made from the exterior.
^ ^a ^b ^c "Our building | School of Engineering | University of Leicester". le.ac.uk. Retrieved 2022-07-13.
^ "Diamond Tipped, Conservation at the Engineering Building, University of Leicester" by Thomas Pearson, University of Leicester Press, 2017, ISBN 978-0-9933380-6-9
^ "University of Leicester Engineering Building - Story of Leicester". www.storyofleicester.info. Retrieved 2022-07-13. Many people recognised the building as ground breaking and it is often said to be the first 'Post-Modern' building in Britain.