Great Malvern, Worcestershire

The Worm

Years ago, when I started this blog, Great Malvern station was one of the buildings I wanted to include. Its combination of impressive sandstone masonry, typical of its architect E. W. Elmslie, and ornate ironwork makes it one of my favourite stations. But back then, there was one feature of this station I did not know about. My recent photograph shows the view towards the tracks from the railway bridge in Avenue Road, close to the station. Next to the tracks, and curving away from them, is a structure of masonry, wood and corrugated iron. It’s a walkway linking Platform 2 with the building that was the Imperial Hotel, on the other side of the road.*

This extraordinary passage – which as far as I know is unique – was a concession to visitors, because you do not come to the West of England for the weather and there is a good chance of getting rained on if you leave the station and cross the road to your hotel. It’s wet here in the West, so if you were more hoity-toity than hoi polloi, you could get straight off your train and walk the short distance to your hotel without getting wet. This direct route is also quicker than going out of the main entrance and doubling back before crossing the road. Exclusivity, comfort, and convenience, Great Malvern Station offered it all.

The locals would look down from the bridge (as visitors travelling through it did not) and marvel at the elegance of its corrugated iron roof, with its slight curving dip towards the eaves. With its clever use of the flexible quality of corrugated iron, combined with the ornate cresting on top and the ornamental supporting framework beneath, it might have made them proud. But they had a sense of humour, and coined a nickname for the posh passengers’ pathway: they called it ‘the worm’.

It must be at least 50 years since the worm has been used, during which time the hotel closed, its building taken over by a school. Rusty and largely unregarded, the structure clings on, amid periodic schemes to restore it. It’s listed, so there’s hope. Long may the worm wriggle.

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*The hotel and bridge are by Elmslie too.

Worcester

Sun and the city
In Worcester the other day, I paused briefly as the afternoon sun went down, moved out of collision range of passing Christmas shoppers, and spent a few moments admiring the impressive array of buildings on the city’s main street. It’s a row of varied structures including a house, a couple of banks, a church, and a hotel, and positioned as it is in the centre of the city it’s surprisingly easy to walk past, dodge other pedestrians most of whom are heading resolutely for the shops, and not give any of it a second glance.

But, as regular readers will know, it’s one of the points of this blog to linger over architecture that’s most often unregarded or taken for granted. So what have we got here? First, in the foreground, my photograph shows half of an early-18th century brick building that I take to have been built as a house. This shows the decorative grace that Georgian classicism can achieve – acanthus keystones above the windows, swags below, neat quoins and cornice, and a finely detailed Ionic doorway. Next to it is a former bank, designed in the Edwardian baroque style by Charles Heathcote of Manchester in 1906. Although smaller than its neighbours, it manages to be very grand, its Portland stone frontage oozing telling details like those columns on the upper floor, the circular window above the doorway, and the iron balcony on the side wall, as if to enable the manager to look down on the hoi polloi below and calculate their credit ratings by eye before they even reach the front door.

Beyond that building is the other bank, dating to 1861–2. Its detailing is a little more restrained than that of its smaller neighbour, more Renaissance palace than baroque, as Pevsner observes. It was built for the Worcester City and County Bank as their headquarters, and this local business fittingly chose a local architect, E. W. Elmslie, who made such a mark on Malvern.

Next in line is St Nicholas Church, now, like the first bank, given over to eating and drinking. The architect of this building of the 1730s is not known but Pevsner tells us that the landmark tower is taken from a design by James Gibbs, one he did but rejected for the church of St Mary Le Strand in London. Its recessed stages culminate in an octagonal cupola with a delicate circular columned lantern at the top. At ground level this striking tower is set off by tall Doric pilasters and a pediment and the whole thing is a grand climax to this part of the street. Its stone catches the sun beautifully too, as it did on the cold winter’s afternoon when I took the photograph.

Visible beyond the church is part of a brick building, also warmed by the sun and partly striped with pale Doulton terracotta. This is a long block, originally housing the Hop Market and Commercial Hotel, built in two stages between 1899 and 1907. The visible end is the later part of the structure and has a striking open lantern topped with another small dome on the street corner, a colourful counterpart to the tower of St Nicholas.

Each of these buildings provides much to take in for anyone with the time to stand and stare. But even the casual passer-by can appreciate how well they work together: a coming together of periods, building materials, and styles that both enlivens a city street and gives it a sense of grandeur. It’s one of those bits of a provincial city not at all where time has stood still but where something of the quality attainable by local architects and builders has been preserved. We should be grateful for that.

Great Malvern, Worcestershire

Quite a lot of Malvern is built in local reddish stone laid in a ‘rock-faced’ fashion. If this rather rustic finish seems a trifle wild and woolly for this somewhat buttoned 19th-century town, the crazy-paving effect is reined in by contrasting pale stone dressing. That’s the approach adopted by E W Elmslie for Malvern’s 1860s railway station, where the details are French-influenced Gothic with lots of gables, pointed windows, trefoils, tall chimneys, and niches.

None of this, though, prepares one for what’s inside, especially the decoration on the columns that support the platform awnings. Here are just three:
They’re ironwork foliage, created by William Forsyth, and they’re exactly right for Malvern, a town of trees and laurel bushes and shrubberies. The idea, apparently, was to feature species that can be found in Malvern’s streets and gardens. They’re also a splendid re-working of a medieval idea. Gothic cathedrals have capitals carved in stone; this Victorian station has capitals made of iron. All change!

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Postscript 2018 I have done a post about the outstanding late-13th century carved capitals in the chapter house at Southwell Minster, here. These stunning carvings, full of life-like portrayals of the foliage of trees, must be among the ancestors of Forsyth’s capitals at Great Malvern.