The Burnley Mechanics is a theatre and former Mechanics' Institute in the market town of

Burnley Burnley () is a town and the administrative centre of the wider Borough of Burnley in Lancashire, England, with a 2001 population of 73,021. It is north of Manchester and east of Preston, at the confluence of the River Calder and River Bru ...

Lancashire Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated Lancs) is the name of a historic county, ceremonial county, and non-metropolitan county in North West England. The boundaries of these three areas differ significantly. The non-metropolitan county of Lancashi ...

, England. It was built 1854–55 and converted to a theatre in 1979.

Historic England Historic England (officially the Historic Buildings and Monuments Commission for England) is an executive non-departmental public body of the British Government sponsored by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. It is tasked wit ...

has designated the theatre a Grade II*

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

History

The Mechanics' Institute was built 1854–55 to a design by

Todmorden Todmorden ( ; ) is a market town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in the Upper Calder Valley in Calderdale, West Yorkshire, England. It is north-east of Manchester, south-east of Burnley and west of Halifax, West Yorkshire, Hal ...

architect James Green. Sir Charles Towneley opened the institute in 1855. It was a club for "reading and discussion by an 'earnest few'". As the town grew, the institute increasingly became a social and cultural community centre. Architect William Waddington enlarged the building in 1888.

Burnley Borough Council Burnley () is a town and the administrative centre of the wider Borough of Burnley in Lancashire, England, with a 2001 population of 73,021. It is north of Manchester and east of Preston, at the confluence of the River Calder and River Bru ...

bought the building in 1959 and leased it to companies for a variety of leisure purposes. In 1979, the interior was reconstructed as a theatre. Burnley Mechanics was designated a Grade II*

on 29 September 1977. The Grade II* designation—the second highest of the three grades—is for "particularly important buildings of more than special interest". It is described by Hartwell and

Pevsner Pevsner or Pevzner is a Jewish surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Aihud Pevsner (1925–2018), American physicist * Antoine Pevsner (1886–1962), Russian sculptor, brother of Naum Gabo * David Pevsner, American actor, singer, da ...

as "one of Burnley's best buildings". John Champness calls its façade "certainly the finest Classical façade in Burnley and among the very best of its date in the country".

Architecture

Burnley Mechanics is built in the

Palazzo style Palazzo style refers to an architectural style of the 19th and 20th centuries based upon the '' palazzi'' (palaces) built by wealthy families of the Italian Renaissance. The term refers to the general shape, proportion and a cluster of characteri ...

sandstone Sandstone is a clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate grains. Sandstones comprise about 20–25% of all sedimentary rocks. Most sandstone is composed of quartz or feldspar (both silicates) ...

ashlar Ashlar () is finely dressed (cut, worked) stone, either an individual stone that has been worked until squared, or a structure built from such stones. Ashlar is the finest stone masonry unit, generally rectangular cuboid, mentioned by Vitruv ...

. Green's original construction is on a rectangular plan with five

bay A bay is a recessed, coastal body of water that directly connects to a larger main body of water, such as an ocean, a lake, or another bay. A large bay is usually called a Gulf (geography), gulf, sea, sound (geography), sound, or bight (geogra ...

s at the front; it is on two storeys. The

ground floor A storey (British English) or story (American English) is any level part of a building with a floor that could be used by people (for living, work, storage, recreation, etc.). Plurals for the word are ''storeys'' (UK) and ''stories'' (US). T ...

has Venetian-style windows with round, rusticated arches. Waddington's extension at the rear of the building is on a slightly lower level. Its design matches that of the rest of the building, but the newer windows have

architrave In classical architecture, an architrave (; from it, architrave "chief beam", also called an epistyle; from Greek ἐπίστυλον ''epistylon'' "door frame") is the lintel or beam that rests on the capitals of columns. The term can ...

s with

pilaster In classical architecture Classical architecture usually denotes architecture which is more or less consciously derived from the principles of Greek and Roman architecture of classical antiquity, or sometimes even more specifically, from the ...

s. On the

second floor A storey (British English) or story (American English) is any level part of a building with a floor that could be used by people (for living, work, storage, recreation, etc.). Plurals for the word are ''storeys'' (UK) and ''stories'' (US). T ...

, there are central windows flanked by

Corinthian column The Corinthian order (Greek: Κορινθιακός ρυθμός, Latin: ''Ordo Corinthius'') is the last developed of the three principal classical orders of Ancient Greek architecture and Roman architecture. The other two are the Doric order ...

s and pilasters. The entrances to the building have coupled Corinthian columns.

References

;Footnotes ;Bibliography * * *

External links

* {{Borough of Burnley buildings Cultural infrastructure completed in 1855 Buildings and structures in Burnley Grade II* listed buildings in Lancashire Theatres in Lancashire Grade II* listed theatres

History

Architecture

See also

References

External links