Electricity Junction Box
Lincoln Square, Manchester, M2 5AS
Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places
Overview
- Heritage Category:
- Listed Building
- Grade:
- II
- List Entry Number:
- 1449639
- Date first listed:
- 30-May-2018
- List Entry Name:
- Electricity Junction Box
- Statutory Address:
- Lincoln Square, Manchester, M2 5AS
Location
Location of this list entry and nearby places that are also listed. Use our map search to find more listed places.
Use of this mapping is subject to terms and conditions .
This map is for quick reference purposes only and may not be to scale.
What is the National Heritage List for England?
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.
The list includes:
 |
Buildings |
 |
Scheduled monuments |
 |
Parks and gardens |
 |
Battlefields |
 |
Shipwrecks |
Local Heritage Hub
Unlock and explore hidden histories, aerial photography, and listed buildings and places for every county, district, city and major town across England.
Discover moreOfficial list entry
- Heritage Category:
- Listed Building
- Grade:
- II
- List Entry Number:
- 1449639
- Date first listed:
- 30-May-2018
- List Entry Name:
- Electricity Junction Box
- Location Description:
- approximately 13m to the north-east of the statue of Abraham Lincoln in Lincoln Square
- Statutory Address 1:
- Lincoln Square, Manchester, M2 5AS
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
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.
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
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.
Location
- Statutory Address:
- Lincoln Square, Manchester, M2 5AS
The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.
- District:
- Manchester (Metropolitan Authority)
- Parish:
- Non Civil Parish
- National Grid Reference:
- SJ8370598142
Summary
Decorative cast-iron electricity junction box of the early C20 by Hardy and Padmore.
Reasons for Designation
The electricity junction box at Lincoln Square, in the civic heart of Manchester, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
Architectural interest:
* for its well-detailed, customised design by a world-renowned company, surviving with relatively little alteration;
* as an increasingly rare example of the type.
Historic interest:
* illustrating the development of electricity into a mass-consumed utility, and the romance and respect which were accorded to its infrastructure in the early years of the twentieth century.
Group value:
* for its strong visual relationship with adjacent listed buildings and the surrounding conservation area.
History
Consumer electricity arrived in Manchester in 1893 and by 1920 the number of consumers was around 20,000. Distribution and supply infrastructure was needed to transfer current from where it was generated to its point of use. The junction box, or feeder pillar, was designed to control the electrical supply to a number of buildings in the surrounding area.
This junction box was produced in the early C20 at the Worcester foundry of Hardy and Padmore. Although electricity pillars are marked nearby on the 1:1250 Ordnance Survey map of 1948, there is not one marked in this location. This example is therefore thought to have been moved here, probably when Lincoln Square was created by clearance of some properties on the south side of Brazennose Street in the 1960s.
The Scotsmen Robert and John Hardy set up their foundry in Worcester in 1814. Richard Padmore joined the partnership in 1829. The foundry was an important English supplier of goods worldwide including lamp posts, tram wire supports and poles, bollards, thresholds and manhole covers. A number of their products are listed including several gas lamps. The company went into voluntary liquidation in 1967.
Details
Electricity junction box, early C20, manufactured by Hardy and Padmore Ltd for Manchester City Council.
MATERIALS: cast iron.
PLAN: rectangular.
DESCRIPTION: the longer sides of the box are parallel with Brazennose Street. It has a low pyramidal cap with castellated edges above a moulded cornice, supported at each corner by an inward-scrolled corbel. Each of the two longer sides is a door with a moulded surround, two decorative strap hinges at the right hand side, and a Jacobean-style geometric strapwork relief surrounding a detachable plaque featuring the crest of the City of Manchester. The two short sides are plain with moulded edges. The box is painted black, with the strapwork design picked out in gold and the city crest fully-coloured. This box does not feature the manufacturer’s name, but is an identical design to known Hardy and Padmore examples nearby.
Sources
Websites
Worcester People and Places, accessed 06/04/2017 from http://www.worcesterpeopleandplaces.org.uk/index.php?mact=News,cntnt01,detail,0&cntnt01articleid=337&cntnt01returnid=93
Other
Frost, R. Electricity in Manchester: Commemorating a century of electricity supply in the city, 1893-1993 - Published 1993
Legal
This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.
The listed building is shown coloured blue on the attached map. Pursuant to s.1 (5A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 (‘the Act’), structures attached to or within the curtilage of the listed building (save those coloured blue on the map) are not to be treated as part of the listed building for the purposes of the Act.
Map
This map is for quick reference purposes only and may not be to scale. This copy shows the entry on 01-Jul-2026 at 22:27:05.
Download a full scale map (PDF)End of official list entry
All text content is available under the Open Government Licence v3.0 , except where otherwise stated. Any supplied maps are © Crown Copyright [and database rights] 2026 OS AC0000815036 and may not be reproduced without permission.