Details
LEEDS
SE2633 WHINGATE, Armley
714-1/32/504 (South West side)
13/05/87 West Leeds High School
(Formerly Listed as:
WHINGATE, Armley
(South West side)
West Leeds Boys' High School)
GV II
School. 1906-1907, altered late C20. By William Broadbent.
Ashlar and red brick with ashlar dressings, graduated slate
roofs.
Double pile plan. 2 and 3 storeys with basement. Symmetrical
26-bay facade with 2-storey with basement, 3:3-bay blocks
flanking taller, 3-storey with basement, 3:2:4:2:3-bay central
block, the rhythm of the whole being A,A,B,C,D,C,B,A,A,
sections B and D breaking forward.
Rusticated ashlar basement and ground floor of central block;
sections defined by rusticated ashlar pilasters, 1st-floor
bays defined by attached ashlar Ionic columns, ashlar sill and
lintel bands; dentilled. 1st- and 2nd-floor cornices. Sections
C have portals; steps up to porches with paired Ionic capitals
supporting entablatures with dentil cornices broken by keyed
segmental arches under segmental pediments with blocking
courses. Inside porches: tessellated floors and panelled,
half-glazed double doors with side-lights and relief-carved
wooden over-panels.
Windows large, with later C20 glazing; section D has 2 triple
windows to basement, side windows narrower and 2 Venetian
windows to ground floor, these echoed by the ground-floor
windows of section C which are 2-light with segmental
overlights, all of them having the ashlar above incised and
voussoirs running into coursing. On 2nd floor of section D, 2
three-light windows under segmental-arched friezes and keyed
archivolts; over central windows of B and outer A section are
keystones rising into broken segmental pediments. Parapets to
sections A, B and D, part balustraded.
Central and outer blocks under separate hipped roofs, each
with ridge cupola having open, round arched, colonnetted
sides, leaded ogee roof and finials, that to centre is larger
and more ornate with weather vane.
Rear: plainer, rhythm echoing that of front, with round arches
over narrower section C upper windows, 6-bay section D having
2 of the upper windows rising through eaves under segmental
pediments, and dentil cornices to sections B, arching over
single upper windows set in raised brick panels. 2-tier
flat-roofed projections from section D (former observation
galleries); single-storey flat-roofed projections from bays B
(former changing rooms), altered.
Returns: 3 wide bays, echoing front, with 5 tall,
segment-arched basement windows, and single, large central
windows above, corniced on ground floor; dentil cornice rising
as central segmental pediment; parapet.
INTERIOR: glazed green tiles to walls of entrances, corridors
have wall tiling (painted over) and segmental-arched recesses
to doors and windows; reinforced concrete floors; stone dogleg
stairs with spiked and knob-finialed iron balusters; main hall
has coffered ceiling with decorative borders to panels.
William Broadbent was architect to the Leeds Education
Department. The school, which accommodated 400 boys and 400
girls, was designed according to the most up-to-date planning
principals and constructional techniques, following
Continental (particularly Swiss) examples and being the first
school in Leeds to have all the floors of reinforced concrete
(Harland pp 11-14).
(Harland, OH: A Chronicle History).
Listing NGR: SE2615633505
