Electricity Junction Box in Castlefield canal basin, Manchester

Summary

Decorative cast-iron electricity junction box of early C20 date by Hardy and Padmore of Worcester.

Reasons for Designation

The electricity junction box on the south bank of the Castlefield canal basin in Manchester, next to the south-east face of the Bridgewater viaduct, a decorative cast-iron feeder pillar of early C20 date, 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 survival of a relic from the first age of electricity.

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 C20.

Group value:
*     standing within 100m of two others of the same type and with a good visual relationship with the listed former Congregational chapel.

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 example was produced probably around the turn of the C20 at the Worcester foundry of Hardy and Padmore.

Feeder pillars like these are first shown (marked as small open rectangles noted as El P, for electricity post or pillar) on the 1:1,250 Ordnance Survey (OS) map of 1948, in small numbers (around 50 in the city centre), mostly on major streets. The nearest to this location were on the north-east corner of the junction of Deansgate with Peter Street, and outside number 15, Whitworth Street West. The latest map showing the pillars is the 1:2,500 OS map of 1965. However, no example is marked in this location on the maps that show the pillars. This example is therefore thought to have been moved here, probably in the late-1980s when the majority of the Castlefield Basin public realm works were carried out.

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, and other Manchester examples of feeder pillars on Library Walk and in Lincoln Square. The company went into voluntary liquidation in 1967.

Details

Electricity junction box, early C20, manufactured by Hardy and Padmore of Worcester, for Manchester City Council.

MATERIALS: cast iron.

DESCRIPTION: standing in the Castlefield Conservation Area, close to the listed former Congregational chapel and to two other examples of this type, on Castle Street and on the north bank of the basin.

The longer sides of the box face north-east and south-west. 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. They each have a circular relief reading ‘Hardy & Padmore Limited, Worcester’ and the north-west side has a raised banner at the base with the registered design number. This side is largely obscured by the wall against which the box stands. The box is painted, black.

Sources

Books and journals
Frost, R, Electricity in Manchester: Commemorating a century of electricity supply in the city, 1893-1993, (1993)

Websites
Information on Hardy & Padmore from Grace's Guide to British Industrial History, accessed 19/03/21 from https://www.gracesguide.co.uk/Hardy_and_Padmore
Information on Hardy and Padmore from local history website, accessed 19/03/21 from https://www.worcesterpeopleandplaces.org.uk/news/383/144/Hardy-and-Padmore-the-Worcester-Foundary.html

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