Old Sarum Airfield: TA Headquarters

Details

LAVERSTOCK

365/0/10010 PORTWAY 01-DEC-05 Old Sarum Airfield (East side) Old Sarum Airfield: TA Headquarters

GV II Station headquarters. 1935 - 6. A Bulloch, architectural advisor to the Air Ministry's Directorate or Works and Buildings. Drawing No 135/35. Flemish bond brick, slate roof covering to pitched area, concrete structure with asphaltic finish to flat section.

PLAN: A main range in 2 storeys with flat roofs is in double-banded offices, with central entrance through a small lobby to large circulating hall, from which a central passageway is taken through on the main axis to a doorway at the rear. This range is flanked at either side by single-storey pavilions with hipped roofs, and across the rear a similar hipped unit, forming an asymmetrical 'H' in plan. The main open-well staircase is in the link building.

EXTERIOR: Small-paned timber sashes to all windows. The central 2-storey range is in 7 bays, with large upper lights, but smaller lower ones to flat segmental heads. A central pair of panelled doors to radial fanlight is set in responds with a moulded arch keystone, and is all original. To each side the pavilions, in the same plane as the 2-storey range, have 3 bays of near-square lights, with 3 on the returns and rear, but the left-hand unit has to the rear an open 3-arched loggia on paired square piers, with voussoir arches to a keystone, and rudimentary capitals and bases. The back of the main range has 2 lights at each level, and returns to the T-arm at the same height, with 3 lights to each level to the NE, but smaller lights and a door, to the stair lobby, on the SW. The transverse rear range, like the pavilions with a high parapet, has 3 lights each side of a pair of doors in arch and responds similar to the front: this was originally the operations room. It returns to 3 bays each end, and 2 on the inner returns. Original hopper-heads and downpipes remain to all elevations.

INTERIOR: plain, retains dog-leg stair and some original joinery.

HISTORY: This is a distinctive design of 1935 by the Air Ministry architect, A Bulloch. Detailing is restrained throughout, but massing, spacing and proportions are carefully considered, in the neo-Georgian style favoured at this period, and influenced by the impact of the Royal Fine Arts Commission, especially though the architect, Sir Edwin Lutyens.

This building makes a significant contribution to a key aviation site. See description of hangars for fuller history and account of Old Sarum airfield.

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:

495995

Legacy System:

LBS

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