Summary
Public library and former shop. 1906 to 1910 to designs by architects J W Broughton and James Hartley of Skipton in a mixed Renaissance style.
Reasons for Designation
Skipton Library, of 1906 to 1910 by J W Broughton and James Hartley, is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
Architectural interest:
* as an imposing presence on High Street, its tall three storeys being considerably higher than the adjacent shops, denoting it as a building of some importance and standing in the town;
* as a strong architectural composition unifying the original multi-purpose use of the building as library, shop and space for the schools with a well-detailed mixed Renaissance style front elevation in good-quality ashlar stone;
* the original layout of the building remains readable, retaining the separate shop arrangement, coffered library ceilings demarcating former subdivisions, and doorways providing interaction between the library and schools’ building;
* good-quality interior fixtures and fittings include the grand main library staircase with stair window containing good-quality stained glass panels by Seward of Lancaster, original doors and architraves, cast-iron Art Nouveau fireplace on the first floor, well-detailed windows with original “Hope” mechanical window opening systems to the upper lights, and a “Tobin Tube” heating/ventilation system throughout.
Historic interest:
* although the library was partially built with money from Andrew Carnegie, whose name became synonymous with the funding of public libraries across Britain in the late C19 and early C20, he refused to provide all the funds required and the remainder was provided by the Council and Mechanics’ Institute, resulting in the unusual inclusion of a separate shop in the building to help finance the costs.
Group value:
* the library, which has a statue of Skipton’s first MP standing outside the building, forms a civic group with the listed Town Hall on the opposite side of High Street.
History
In 1887 Skipton Mechanics’ Institute proposed a permanent memorial in the form of a new school or institute to celebrate Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee. A new Science and Arts School was was subsequently built on a site set back from the High Street, behind the old shop buildings of S Birdsall, jewellers and watchmakers, and H Wildman, cabinet maker and upholsterer. It was opened in 1894.
There had always been an intention to have a library too, providing an impressive entrance in place of the two shops on the High Street. However the school building opened with a deficit and money was needed for furnishing. In 1896 a new subscription list was opened but was unable to raise the necessary funds for the frontage building. Following a meeting held in July 1902 between Skipton Urban District Council, the trustees of the Science and Art Schools and the committee of the Mechanics’ Institute, a solution was sought by contacting Andrew Carnegie to request £6,000 for a public library This would be built in front of the Science and Arts Schools building, with the library of the Mechanics’ Institute forming the nucleus of the public library. Andrew Carnegie agreed to give £3,000 on condition that the Free Libraries Act was adopted, the site was given for the building and a sum of £500 was raised for investment, the interest to accumulate and supplement the rate allowed by the Free Libraries’ Act of 1903. The £1,200 mortgage on the shop property then occupying the site also had to be paid off.
The money needed to meet these conditions was not raised until October 1906. In addition it was decided that the building was to contain both the library and a smaller property united by a shared façade. The latter, belonging to the trustees of the Mechanics’ Institute, was to be occupied by Wildman’s shop. Plans were then prepared jointly by Mr J W Broughton and Mr James Hartley of Skipton and construction started in 1908 after the frontage shops were demolished. The figure of Knowledge over the main door and panels of figures representing Literature and Art were carved by Mr R G Phillip of Embsay, who had previously been a student teacher at the Science and Arts Schools. The library was formally opened on February 19, 1910, by Sir Mathew Wilson, Bart of Eshton Hall.
The ground floor of the library was occupied by a public reading room, with a wide staircase leading to the first floor which contained the lending library, a reference library and a children’s library, with fumed oak furnishings throughout. About 7,000 books were available to borrow. The top floor and basement were rented by the Schools to provide extra accommodation, with the large room on the top floor to be used for lectures and meetings. The south bay on the ground floor was separately occupied by Wildman’s and students entered the Schools building from the High Street via a ginnel through the north side of the building.
In 1914 the Petyt Library was moved to the ground floor of the library. It had been bequeathed to Skipton in 1719 by Sylvester Petyt (1638-1719), who was educated at Skipton Grammar School along with this brother, William (1635-1707) before both became wealthy and influential lawyers in London.
In 1928 the new Craven Museum moved into the second floor of the library building. It was initially run on a voluntary basis, but from 1934 it was taken over by the district council and the librarian’s job became that of “librarian and curator”. The museum collection continued to expand and in the 1950s further room was found by redesigning the basement as exhibition rooms. After 1957 the library also gained extra space by taking in the two upper storeys above Wilman’s shop. Then in 1960 the museum collections on the second floor were also moved and rehoused on the ground floor. In 1973 the museum was officially moved to its present location in the Town Hall across the road and the ground floor reverted back to the library’s reading room. When the museum moved out of the library, the college negotiated access to their building through the main library entrance and the original interconnecting double doors at the rear of the staircase hall, rather than via the ginnel.
In 1982 the lending library was moved from the first floor to the ground floor of the library to commemorate the Year of the Disabled, with a ramp added and the timber and part-glazed partition walls removed to make access easier. The former Wildman’s shop became the college’s main entrance and reception at this time, with the doorway widened but otherwise retaining its shop front appearance.
In 2018 the Petyt Library, now known as the Petyt Collection, was rehoused in the archive at the University of York.
Details
Public library and former shop. 1906 to 1910 to designs by architects J W Broughton and James Hartley of Skipton in a mixed Renaissance style.
MATERIALS: the library is constructed of regularly coursed Eastburn ashlar with roughly squared and coursed rubblestone and some white glazed facing tiles to the rear, and a slate roof.
PLAN: the three-storey, T-shaped library building fronts the High Street with the narrower rear block linking it to the college building* at the rear, which is not of special interest and is excluded from the library's listing. The two buildings inter-connect internally with doors on each floor. The ground and first floors of the library are linked by a wide staircase, with the second floor (formerly used by the museum) most recently used by the college, and a basement (also formerly used by the museum). The south ground-floor bay (originally Wildman’s shop) has most recently been used as the main street front entrance for the college; the original ginnel entrance runs through the north end of the building.
EXTERIOR: the building stands opposite the Town Hall on the west side of High Street, the façade in-line with the adjoining building frontages.
The ashlar front elevation is of five bays and three tall storeys (also with a basement). The high plinth with moulded string band and the ground floor have banded rustication, pilasters define bays with frieze bands between floors and beneath the eaves cornice. The roof is hidden behind a parapet with round-headed balustrading and triangular gablets over the second and fourth bays, with a stone gable stack to each side. The windows have stone mullions and/or transoms with multi-pane leaded lights with the exception of the timber former shop front in the first bay.
The ground floor has a wide, round-headed library entrance in the second bay with a giant enriched keystone also forming a console bracket for the first-floor oriel window. A female head of Knowledge with cornucopias is flanked by dragons. Attached to the wall on either side of the doorway is a rectangular relief carved panel with a classical kneeling female figure, holding an open book to the left and a globe to the right. To the front of the recessed entrance lobby are double iron gates with foliate decoration to the shaped tops. The lobby has a timber boarded ceiling with moulded cornice, with a modern tiled ramped floor and inner glazed metal door and screen. The first bay has a wide, segmental arch flanked by pilasters raised on high bases. Set into the archway is a timber shopfront (presently - 2023 - Craven College entrance) with a central slender turned mullion with curved spandrels to the recessed doorway to the left and plate glass window to the right and a multi-pane glazed overlight above. The doorway is panelled with a display window (with poster) to the left, angled window to the right and timber boarded ceiling. At the rear are double, panelled and glazed doors with a rectangular overlight. The third and fourth bays have a pair of large segmental-arched, six-light windows; the central top lights are bottom-hinged and open inwards. They are flanked by outer pilasters raised on high bases. The fifth bay has a round-headed pedestrian entrance to the ginnel (formerly the primary access route to the college building behind), with a metal railing gate and fanlight. The frieze between the ground and first floors has round-headed balustrading beneath the windows, some slightly projecting from the wall face. Above the library entrance is a canted oriel window with stone mullions and transoms. The first bay of the first floor has a large square-headed, six-light window with square-headed, four-light windows in the third and fourth bays and a narrow, two-light, transom window in the fifth bay. The second bay of the second floor has panelled pilasters with enriched ionic capitals, a mullion window with four round-headed lights and relief-carved FREE LIBRARY to the frieze above. To the left are a pair of two-light mullioned windows separated by a slender pilaster. Bays three and four each have a square-headed, two-light mullioned window and bay five has a narrow, square-headed, single-light window. The second-bay gablet has a circular window with enriched and moulded frame and side finials. The fourth-bay gablet also has a circular window, with a blocky stone frame. Both windows have leaded multi-pane glazing.
The visible upper parts of the north and south gable elevations are rendered with stone quoins to the corners and ashlar coping stones.
The rear elevation is of roughly coursed and squared rubblestone with squared ashlar surrounds to the vertical square-headed windows and a full-height, central projecting link block attaching the library building to the college building* to the rear. On the left-hand, north side of the rear wall there are two close bays with windows on the first and second floors and the ginnel entry to the left on the ground floor, with an adjacent canted window projecting out from the ground floor of the link block. The first-floor windows have one-over-one pane horned sashes and the second-floor windows have opening upper casements. The two bays on the right-hand, south side have windows with one-over-one pane horned sashes on the first and second floors. The ground floor is obscured by modern extensions to the college building*. The north side of the link block is inset from the corner of the college building*. It has white glazed facing tiles and three vertical square-headed windows with ashlar jambs, sill bands and lintel bands to the first and second floors. The ground-floor canted window outshot wraps round the north-east corner of the college building*. It too has white glazed facing tiles and an ashlar mullioned and transomed window frame with a lower row of four tall windows and one angled window at the right-hand end with a row of shorter windows above, all with timber frames. The lean-to roof is of leaded glass panels. The south side of the link block is flush with the wall face of the college building* on the second floor and projects out and wraps round it on the ground and first floors. The ground floor is obscured by modern extensions*. The upper floors are faced in white glazed tiles with squared ashlar dressings to the windows. The mullioned second-floor window has one-over-one pane horned sashes. The first floor has a large, eight-light ashlar mullioned and transomed stair window with a lean-to roof, now with perspex sheets, with stone coping. To the left are two pairs of small WC windows with ashlar frames and a lower, lean-to slate roof.
INTERIOR: the layout remains largely unaltered, although original timber panelled and multi-pane glazed partitioning which subdivided spaces were removed in the early 1980s to open out the rooms. The ground and first floors have coffered ceilings with moulded cornices. The building is fitted with a “Tobin Tube” heating/ventilation system throughout and also “Hope” mechanical opening systems to allow upper windows to be opened.
A vestibule opens out with curved side walls into a wider staircase hall with the ground-floor library (now children’s library) to the right. The open-well staircase rises between the ground and first floors with a wide half landing lit by a staircase window. The staircase has teak treads with a bronze Art-Nouveau style balustrade with a moulded swept oak handrail with octagonal newel posts at top and bottom and oak panelling to the inner walls, and a short section of panelling beneath the steps on the ground floor. The mullioned and transomed stair window has stained glass panels by Seward of Lancaster of the Skipton and Clifford’s coats-of-arms, scrolls, ribbons and the white rose of York. At the rear of the staircase hall are original panelled and part-glazed double doors with a wide moulded architrave linking the library with the college building to the rear. The two large, segmental-arched windows lighting the front library space have side-hung casements with Art Nouveau iron handles and hopper lights above opened by the mechanical window opening system. The rear of the library is partially separated by a wall projecting from the north wall and the adjacent canted window lighting the smaller rear space has fixed lower lights and four opening hopper lights above with opening system.
The ground floor of the former Wildman’s shop (later college reception) does not interconnect with the library internally; an inserted doorway links it to a modern college extension*. There are two boxed-in cross beams and moulded cornices.
On the first floor the head of the main staircase is enclosed by later partition walls incorporating a timber and glazed screen with a glazed timber door at the east end leading into the opened-out library. The wider front area has a central chimneybreast to the north wall with a tall cast-iron fireplace with Art Nouveau detailing and small, brown glazed tiles to the cheeks. A freestanding square column has oak dado panelling. The front-elevation windows are similarly detailed as the ground floor with side-hung casements and overhead hopper windows. To the rear, in the south-west corner, the doorway to the WCs and an adjacent doorway linking the library to the college building have five-panelled doors with moulded architraves. In the south-east corner a repositioned oak panelled and part-glazed door with Librarian signage leads into the front first-floor room of the former Wildman’s (now computer room). The rear staff room contains a corner timber staircase rising to the second floor with turned balusters and newel posts, ramped handrail and plank-boarded underside.
On the second floor the front (south-east) room is separated from the stair landing by a partition of relocated oak panelled and multi-pane glazed partitioning and doors. A doorway has been inserted between this room and the large second-floor room (used by the college), which also has a doorway linking it to the college* to the rear. In the centre of the north wall is a chimneybreast. Roof trusses are partly visible beneath the later suspended ceiling with stone corbel brackets, shaped spandrels between the rafters and tie beams, and purlins, with bolted long iron straps. The windows are fixed and side-hung casements.
Beneath the main staircase a flight of stone steps leads down to the basement. It has an outer balustrade with square iron rod baluster and swept timber handrail with a newel roundel. There are three large rooms with concrete floors. The front (east) room has a blocked doorway in the south wall, formerly into the basement of Wildman’s shop. Off the rear (west) room, in the south-west corner, is a cloakroom and WC area with windows into a light well and two four-panelled doors.
MAPPING NOTE: the library is attached to the college building (originally the Science and Arts Schools) to the rear, which is not included in the listing. On the north side the link block of the library has a canted window outshot which wraps round the north-east corner of the college building*. On the south side of the link block the ground and first floors project out and overlap the south-east corner of the college building*.
* Pursuant to s1 (5A) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 199- ("the Act") it is declared that the aforementioned college building (originally the Science and Art Schools) and its modern extensions are not of special architectural or historic interest, however any works which have a potential to affect the character of the listed building as a building of special architectural or historic interest may still require LBC and this is a matter for the LPA to determine.
