Sheffield: A new chapter

Barely a week goes by at Sheffield Modernist HQ without an image of the Arts Tower crossing our screens.

In fact, the most popular post of our entire history on both Instagram and Twitter was Robert Blomfield’s photograph, the Arts Tower from Western Bank (1965). Here a glamorous headscarfed woman dashes like Grace Kelly across an empty A57 in front of a white-silled two-storey house – sitting neatly in the place the Alfred Denny Building will occupy five years later. Behind, the Tower looms in all its sci-fi luminosity and it is as if from this vision of the future, the woman runs.

Very much the centrepiece and certainly the most iconic building of the University of Sheffield’s post-war development programme, The Arts Tower, built in 1966, stands a full 255ft (78m) high. It remained the tallest building in the city until 2009, when it was ousted by St Paul’s Tower on Arundel Gate. But, by sitting atop one of Sheffield’s famous seven hills, it remains physically higher. The vertiginous views from the upper floors provide a breathtaking backdrop to the annual Sheffield School of Architecture Summer Show. And whether it’s vertigo, the lack of oxygen or that exhilarating mix of intellect and creativity only architects have, the atmosphere is definitely not the same up there. How you arrive is not for the faint-hearted either. With twenty storeys above ground,  stairs are a brave option. I’ll leave it to you whether you take the lift or the genuinely terrifying paternoster.

Designed by Gollins, Melvin, Ward and Partners, the Arts Tower formed part of their successful entry into the university’s open competition in 1953. Sheffield was the only civic university to search for an architect in this way. This openness to change reflects those early civic beginnings when a call for donations in 1904 raised over £50,000 (equivalent to £15 million today) in penny donations from local steel and factory workers and residents. At that time, the university offered non-degree programmes of study and genuine accessibility to those keen on self-development. Civic University’s status also entailed a commitment to help the local economy, a pledge that requires a sensitive balance of local needs with development strategy.

The Arts Tower is connected by a walkway to the elegant, black lacquered jewellery box that is Western Bank Library, opened by T.S Eliot in 1959, a Modernist poet for a Modernist library. Originally built to cater for 2,000 students with 400 reading spaces, the rapid expansion of the university meant it was already too small on completion. Designed in the International Style, architectural historian Nikolaus Pevsner called it the best modern building in Sheffield. The main catalogue hall remains a striking space with its panelled interior and minimalist furniture that even the addition of photocopying and self-scanning equipment cannot spoil. This leads to the main reading room, a wide rectangle overlooking Weston Park, naturally lit by floor-to-ceiling glass on three sides. Around this are black shelves containing 130,000 books on two levels.  Despite being the first library in the UK designed with facilities for temperature, humidity and air control, the heat in the library is very uncomfortable in the summer months, and it is currently closed for another set of improvements on its ventilation and cooling system before the new academic year.

For the true bibliophile, the four stacks beneath the reading room deliver on their intention to house a million books. Descending through a narrow staircase, this is an airless, disorientating territory where it would be easy to lose your way and your mind. New signage with large clear arrows points the lost wanderer back to the exit. But it is also here that so many modernist gems can be found amongst the piles of Architects’ Journal and The Architectural Review.

One of the six original ‘red brick’ universities with Birmingham, Bristol, Leeds, Liverpool and Manchester, the University of Sheffield noticeably increased its science and engineering offering in the 1960s. This resulted in the construction of some of the larger buildings on the central campus: the Hicks Building, the Alfred Denny Building, Sir Robert Hadfield Building, and the Chemical Engineering Building. It was another natural progression from its origins in the amalgamation of Sheffield School of Medicine, Firth College and Sheffield Technical School. University House, the Students’ Union and five architecturally inspired Halls of Residence were also built at this time, notably Tapton, designed by Tom Mellor and Partners, 1967-9.

Whilst only The Arts Tower and Western Bank Library are Grade II listed, it would be remiss not the mention the Geography Building. Anathema to architects Alison and Peter Smithson, it was purpose-built for the department in 1970 and gained a Civic Trust commendation. The Geography Building is easily identified by its hexagonal shape, following through to the teaching rooms inside. As with the construction of The Arts Tower and Western Bank Library, a significant number of terraced homes were demolished to make space for it. It is difficult to say whether the horizontal, multi-functional slabs envisaged by the Smithsons in their rejected 1953 entry would have caused more or less disturbance.

Although I have focused on the University of Sheffield here, Sheffield Hallam University, which dominates the city’s centre, plays an equally important role in local dynamics. It is about the only thing you see when you exit Sheffield station, resulting in bewildered visitors wondering where the city actually is. Wonderfully, many students do stay and settle in our city. What remains in the balance is the temporary and transitory nature of student life and the perpetual change in higher education. It often seems that the city centre is in a constant cycle of demolition and construction without appropriate care for lifespan, purpose and even aesthetics. Further, making buildings accessible to all and reaching out to the community in which it serves as well as its paying customers will go some way to unifying the city.

Helen Angell is a poetry and non-fiction writer, mentor and education consultant. She also coordinates the Sheffield Modernist with Sean Madner. Here we tour the post-war campus landscape and ride the famous paternoster lift!

More information on Robert Blomfield. More images Flickr. View Sheffield Modernist IG.