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West Branch Library

West Branch Library, Oxford Road

Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places

Overview

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1302878
Date first listed:: 14-Dec-1978
List Entry Name:: West Branch Library
Statutory Address:: West Branch Library, Oxford Road

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Location

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The National Heritage List for England is a unique register of our country's most significant historic buildings and sites. The places on the list are protected by law and most are not open to the public.

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🏰 Scheduled monuments
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⚓ Shipwrecks

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Date:: 2001-08-31
Reference:: IOE01/03950/20
Rights:: © Ms Pamela Jackson. Source: Historic England Archive

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1302878
Date first listed:: 14-Dec-1978
List Entry Name:: West Branch Library
Statutory Address 1:: West Branch Library, Oxford Road

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

Location

Statutory Address:: West Branch Library, Oxford Road

The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.

District:: Reading (Unitary Authority)
Parish:: Non Civil Parish
National Grid Reference:: SU 69618 73673

Details

SU 67 SE 16/543

Oxford Road (north side) West Branch Library

II

1907 designed by F.W. Albury. A good example in "Wren-naissance" style. One 1/2 storeys. Red brick with Bath stone ashlar dressings, moulded plinth, modillion cornice and cope to parapet. Three bays each side or fabled porch break with paired glazing bar casement windows flanked by paired pilasters. Hipped tiled roof with two tripartite segmental dormers behind parapet. Wooden cupola with Doric peristyle and lead dome. Segmental headed entrance with concave surround. Gable over has three busts - Milton, Shakespeare and (possibly) Darwin.

Stone commemorative tablets on each side laid by Edward Jackson (mayor) and Dr Jameson Hurry (local antiquary) 16.x.1907. Lobby has marble commemorative plaques naming architect, donor Andrew Carnegie, G W Palmer (who opened it) and builders (T H Kingerlee and Sons).

Interior: top lit central hall with stained glass (The Abbey, Reading and University badges). Three rooms, side rooms have plaster barrel vault, and modillion cornice and dormers in ceiling. Glazed screen fronts desk to north room.

Listing NGR: SU6961873673

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:: 39111
Legacy System:: LBS

Sources

Websites
British Geological Survey, Strategic Stone Study, accessed 4 February 2020 from https://www.bgs.ac.uk/mineralsuk/buildingStones/StrategicStoneStudy/EH_atlases.html

Legal

This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.