3-047-043 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The new City Library, Guildhall, 1872. 'This edifice is a Gothic structure, in the style known as Perpendicular, and, being intended to be used as a suite of reception-rooms on occasions of civic festivity, it has been so arranged as to serve a double purpose...[It is] a noble room, 120 ft. long and nearly 60 ft. in height. It is surmounted by an open oak roof, and is lit by a clerestory of seven windows on each side, above the arches or bays which divide what may be described as its "nave" from its "aisles" on each side. The nave will be left open and unoccupied, the books being ranged in the aisles between the bays in the three-sided compartments, to insure privacy and quiet. One of these compartments is reserved for the use of "ladies only". The books are so arranged as to be all within the reader' reach, without the aid of moveable steps or ladder. This is effected by a light gallery which runs through every compartment...The sculptured string-course which runs round the room below the clerestory is very elaborately carved with foliage...The new buildings will cost about £50,000, exclusive of the site, for which £10,000 has been paid...The architect of the new building is Mr. Horace Jones, the architect to the Corporation of London'. From "Illustrated London News", 1872.