The Engineering Building is part of the

University of Leicester The University of Leicester ( ) is a public university, public research university based in Leicester, England. The main campus is south of the city centre, adjacent to Victoria Park, Leicester, Victoria Park. The university's predecessor, Univ ...

. It was designed by the architects James Stirling and

James Gowan James Gowan (18 October 1923 – 12 June 2015) was a Scottish-born architect known for his post-modernist designs of the "engineering style" which influenced a generation of British architects. Life Gowan was born in Pollokshields, Glasgow in ...

The Red Trilogy

The building is part of the ''Red Trilogy'' by James Stirling. Beginning in the late 1950s, the architect designed three university buildings featuring distinctly red materials: red bricks and red tiles. The ''Red Trilogy'' includes the Engineering Building, University of Leicester (1959–1963), the

Faculty of History, University of Cambridge The Faculty of History is one of the constituent departments of the University of Cambridge. Teaching and research of history has centuries old roots at Cambridge and the first Regius Professorship of Modern History was established by King Geo ...

(1964–1967), and the Florey Building,

The Queen's College, Oxford The Queen's College is a constituent college of the University of Oxford, England. The college was founded in 1341 by Robert de Eglesfield in honour of Philippa of Hainault, queen of England. It is distinguished by its predominantly neoclassi ...

(1966–1971). James Stirling and James Gowan worked together on the design for the Engineering Building. The ''Trilogy's'' two later buildings were designed by Stirling, without Gowan.

Design

The Engineering Building is a large and complex structure. Stirling and Gowan were tasked to design spaces for

offices An office is a space where the employees of an organization perform administrative work in order to support and realize the various goals of the organization. The word "office" may also denote a position within an organization with specific dut ...

laboratories A laboratory (; ; colloquially lab) is a facility that provides controlled conditions in which science, scientific or technological research, experiments, and measurement may be performed. Laboratories are found in a variety of settings such as s ...

auditorium An auditorium is a room built to enable an audience to hear and watch performances. For movie theaters, the number of auditoriums is expressed as the number of screens. Auditoriums can be found in entertainment venues, community halls, and t ...

, and

workshops Beginning with the Industrial Revolution era, a workshop may be a room, rooms or building which provides both the area and tools (or machinery) that may be required for the manufacture or repair of manufactured goods. Workshops were the only ...

with heavy machinery. The design also includes a

water tank A water tank is a container for Water storage, storing water, for many applications, drinking water, irrigation, fire suppression, farming, both for plants and livestock, chemical manufacturing, food preparation as well as many other uses. Water ...

on top. The workshops are located in the low-rise section of the building, in a hall with a rectangular floor plan. Connected to the workshop hall is the tower, which houses auditorium, offices, and laboratories. The water tank sits on top of the tower. The tower section is notable for its chamfered edges and its

prismatic An optical prism is a transparent optics, optical element with flat, polished surfaces that are designed to refraction, refract light. At least one surface must be angled—elements with two parallel surfaces are ''not'' prisms. The most fami ...

geometry. The auditorium is located at the base of the tower. The auditoriums seating arrangement is designed typically stadium-like with staggered rows of seats. The angled auditorium floor results in a pronounced wedge-shape on the building's exterior. The tower's facades are clad in glass and red tiles, the workshop hall's facade is entirely made of

frosted glass Frosted glass is produced by the sandblasting or acid Glass etching, etching of clear sheet glass. This creates a pitted surface on one side of the glass pane and has the effect of rendering the glass translucent by scattering the light which ...

. A unique feature of the workshop hall is its roof construction. The roof's geometry is rotated by 45 degrees in respect to the floor plan's orientation. This results in a unique jagged roof line and a diamond-pattern-like perimeter. The roof appears as a series of multiple translucent prisms. The translucent effect was achieved by lining the glass panes with fibre-glass. Other parts of the glass shell are completely opaque, in contrast. Here, the glass panes were coated with a thin layer of aluminium. Stirling and Gowan were commissioned in 1957. The design is dated to 1959. Construction lasted from 1960 to 1963. The consulting structural engineer was

Frank Newby Frank Newby (26 March 1926 – 10 May 2001) was one of the leading structural engineers of the 20th century, working with such architects as Philip Powell and Hidalgo Moya, Eero Saarinen, Cedric Price,James Gowan (architect) James Stirling, a ...

Refurbishment

By 2013 the deterioration of the glazed facades in the Workshop blocks and low rise Block had got to a position that something had to be done; refurbishment of the facade, structure and associated building systems was now essential. Clearly the challenges around a necessary refurbishment were enormous. The building was at risk failing completely without a full fabric replacement, and it was always freezing cold in winter and unbearably hot in summer. The leaky single glazed steel framed glazing was replaced with English Heritage approval with aluminium framed double-glazed units. The internal

HVAC Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC ) is the use of various technologies to control the temperature, humidity, and purity of the air in an enclosed space. Its goal is to provide thermal comfort and acceptable indoor air quality. ...

systems had to be replaced almost like for like, but clever solutions were realised to turn the heating system (exposed pipe coils and ventilation fan units) into a changeover system with elevated chilled water in summer providing peak lop cooling. Work was undertaken by a large Contractor and Consultant supply chain working with the University of Leicester and English Heritage. The project was commenced in January 2016 and successfully completed by the end of 2017, saving the building's unique architecture for many generations to come.

Recognition

The ''Red Trilogy'' in general, and the Engineering Building in particular, are recognized as turning points in the development of postwar modern architecture. James Stirling went beyond the paradigm of pure functionalism. The Engineering Building's color and geometry are more decorative than the typical 1950s and 1960s

brutalist architecture Brutalist architecture is an architectural style that emerged during the 1950s in the United Kingdom, among the reconstruction projects of the post-war era. Brutalist buildings are characterised by Minimalism (art), minimalist constructions th ...

. The three buildings of the ''Red Trilogy'' were designed consecutively. The Leicester Engineering Building first, the Cambridge History Faculty second, the Oxford Florey Building third. Their successive designs illustrate James Stirling's way towards

postmodernist architecture Postmodern architecture is a style or movement which emerged in the 1960s as a reaction against the austerity, formality, and lack of variety of modern architecture, particularly in the international style advocated by Philip Johnson and Henry-R ...

. The designs are progresisvely more playful and decorative. The Engineering Building represents Stirling's first step from brutalism towards postmodernism. Therefore, the building is regarded as one of the origins of postmodern architecture. At the same time, the Engineering Building als is praised as one of Britains high points of brutalist architecture. Elain Harwoods book ''Space, Hope, and Brutalism'' features a photo of the Engineering Building's workshop hall on its cover. The building is a protected heritage site with a Grade 2 listing.

References

External links

* {{Commons category-inline, Engineering Building, University of Leicester
Article originally published in 1963
in the magazine

Architectural Review ''The Architectural Review'' is a monthly international architectural magazine. It has been published in London since 1896. Its articles cover the built environment – which includes landscape, building design, interior design and urbanism � ...