
Mosley Street is a street in
Manchester
Manchester () is a city and the metropolitan borough of Greater Manchester, England. It had an estimated population of in . Greater Manchester is the third-most populous metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, with a population of 2.92&nbs ...
, England. It runs between its junction with
Piccadilly Gardens and
Market Street to
St Peter's Square. Beyond St Peter's Square it becomes Lower Mosley Street. It is the location of several Grade II and Grade II*
listed building
In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...
s.
Mosley Street tram stop was located near Piccadilly Gardens. In 2009, the tram lines on Mosley Street were reconstructed. Historically buses used Mosley Street en route to Piccadilly Gardens, however the services were rerouted along
Portland Street in 2011. The street is now used by
Metrolink trams and no cars are permitted on the street, although emergency service vehicles can still use the road and traffic signals at junctions remain in operational. The tram stop closed on 17 May 2013.
History
The streets in the neighbourhood were laid in the 1780s and by the early 19th century Mosley Street was the centre of the fashionable residential part of town with institutions such as the
Portico Library and the
Royal Manchester Institution. The street was named after
Nicholas Mosley who in 1596 bought the
manor of Manchester for £3,500. His father, Edward Mosley, already owned
Hough End Hall, which was the manor house of
Withington. The Mosley family sold their manorial rights to
Manchester City Council for £200,000 in 1846. In the first quarter of the 19th century the street was home to
Hugh Birley,
Samuel Brooks and
Nathan Mayer Rothschild.
The nature of the street changed after 1827, when a house on the corner of Market Street was converted into a hotel and rooms in its coach house on Back Mosley Street were used as a warehouse. Several more warehouses were built after 1830 and large houses occupied by the gentry were speculatively converted to warehouses. The Congregational Chapel, in Cannon Street, was replaced by a chapel in Mosley Street and in 1848 the congregation moved again out of the centre of Manchester, to the chapel in Cavendish Street,
Chorlton on Medlock.
Notable buildings
File:Manchester Art Gallery - geograph.org.uk - 1748756.jpg, The Manchester Art Gallery
Manchester Art Gallery, formerly Manchester City Art Gallery, is a publicly owned art museum on Mosley Street in Manchester city centre, England. The main gallery premises were built for a learned society in 1823 and today its collection occupi ...
File:Portico Library.jpg, The Portico Library, on the corner of Charlotte Street
File:38 and 42 Mosley Street, Manchester 4 straight.JPG, 38 and 42 Mosley Street
File:One New York Street.JPG, 1 New York Street
;East side
*The
Portico Library on the corner of Charlotte Street was Manchester's first subscription library, built in the
Classical style between 1802 and 1806 by
Thomas Harrison of
Chester
Chester is a cathedral city in Cheshire, England, on the River Dee, Wales, River Dee, close to the England–Wales border. With a built-up area population of 92,760 in 2021, it is the most populous settlement in the borough of Cheshire West an ...
. It was altered to become a bank and library in the 1920s and is now a public house and library.
John Dalton
John Dalton (; 5 or 6 September 1766 – 27 July 1844) was an English chemist, physicist and meteorologist. He introduced the atomic theory into chemistry. He also researched Color blindness, colour blindness; as a result, the umbrella term ...
described its location as in "the most elegant and retired street in town".
*The Royal Manchester Institution, now
Manchester Art Gallery
Manchester Art Gallery, formerly Manchester City Art Gallery, is a publicly owned art museum on Mosley Street in Manchester city centre, England. The main gallery premises were built for a learned society in 1823 and today its collection occupi ...
, was designed by
Charles Barry
Sir Charles Barry (23 May 1795 – 12 May 1860) was an English architect best known for his role in the rebuilding of the Palace of Westminster (also known as the Houses of Parliament) in London during the mid-19th century, but also responsi ...
and built between 1824 and 1835. It is built in the Greek
Ionic style in
rusticated sandstone
ashlar
Ashlar () is a cut and dressed rock (geology), stone, worked using a chisel to achieve a specific form, typically rectangular in shape. The term can also refer to a structure built from such stones.
Ashlar is the finest stone masonry unit, a ...
. It is a Grade II* Listed building.
*Red brick offices and a trade warehouse (nos. 77, 77a; 14 & 16 Princess Street) built on the south corner of Princess Street around 1860–70 are occupied by a bank and offices and are Grade II listed.
;West side
*At 10 Mosley Street, the bank, later
Williams Deacon's and
Bradford & Bingley was built in the
Classical style for the Manchester and Salford Bank in 1836 by Richard Tattershall. It is constructed in sandstone
ashlar
Ashlar () is a cut and dressed rock (geology), stone, worked using a chisel to achieve a specific form, typically rectangular in shape. The term can also refer to a structure built from such stones.
Ashlar is the finest stone masonry unit, a ...
under a slate roof and is Grade II listed.
*Shops and offices on a corner site at 12 Mosley Street were built in an eclectic
neo-Gothic style between 1870 and 1880. The building has an
iron frame clad in
sandstone
Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...
ashlar
Ashlar () is a cut and dressed rock (geology), stone, worked using a chisel to achieve a specific form, typically rectangular in shape. The term can also refer to a structure built from such stones.
Ashlar is the finest stone masonry unit, a ...
and a slate roof. It is Grade II listed.
*Harvest House at 14 and 16 Mosley Street was built as a textile warehouse for
Richard Cobden in 1839 by
Edward Walters in the Italian
palazzo style in red brick in
Flemish bond
Flemish bond is a pattern of brickwork that is a common feature in Georgian architecture. The pattern features bricks laid lengthwise (''stretchers'') alternating with bricks laid with their shorter ends exposed (''headers'') within the same cou ...
with sandstone dressings and is Grade II listed. It was later altered to become shops.
*The Grade II Colwyn Chambers at Mosley Street's junction with York Street was built for the Lancashire Mercantile Bank in 1898 by J. Gibbons Sankey and is now occupied by shops, a restaurant and offices.
*At
38 and 42 Mosley Street is a bank built in 1862 in the Italian
palazzo style which was the last great work of
Edward Walters. Now occupied by the Royal Bank of Scotland it was built for the Manchester and Salford Bank and extensions around 1880 were carried out by Walters' successors, Barker and Ellis. The bank is built in ashlar under slate roofs.
See also
*
List of streets and roads in Manchester
References
;Sources
*
* Tait, James (1904), ''Mediæval Manchester and the Beginnings of Lancashire'', Manchester University Press
* Willan, Thomas Stuart (1980), ''Elizabethan Manchester'', Manchester University Press
{{Commons category, Mosley Street, Manchester
Streets in Manchester