Leicester

Gobblery

The histories of architecture are full of the big names, the people who changed the course of the art and transformed our towns and countryside: the Wrens, Vanbrughs, and Gilbert Scotts. Less well known are the local practitioners, architects who did important work in a particular town or area but are generally unsung outside their local patch: men like Watson Fothergill of Nottingham, the Jearrads of Cheltenham, and Arthur Wakerley of Leicester. Wakerley was a prominent figure in his city – a Liberal, councilor, and mayor. He served as president of Leicester’s Society of Architects and as president of the Temperance Union. His many buildings in the city range from a synagogue to a number of factories, from a hotel to streets of affordable housing.

The Turkey Café in Granby Street is one of his smaller buildings, but its central position, unusual style, and rich decoration make it one of his most noticeable. Wakerley designed it in Art Nouveau style in 1900, with the odd-shaped arches and colour scheme indicating a certain Oriental influence. The decoration was done by Doulton’s W J Neatby, the ceramic artist who worked on the Royal Arcade in Norwich and the Everard Printing Works in Bristol, both previously noticed on this blog. Wakerley devised a complex façade enlivened with multifoil arches, big windows, and a bowed central section. Neatby covered the walls in green and white tiles, adding a dazzling multicoloured turkey at the very top and two three-dimensional ceramic turkeys at entrance level. He picked the café’s name out in curvaceous Art Nouveau style lettering.


When the building opened in 1901 cafés were enjoying a heyday. Leicester boasted several cafés, establishments that were celebrated by the temperance movement that Arthur Wakerley embraced. Cafés were also favoured by women. At a time when pubs were rowdy, male preserves, women lacked places that they could go safely on their own or with women friends. Cafés and tea shops (the famous ABCs run by the Aerated Bread Company, for example, and the Lyon’s Corner Houses that came slightly later) filled this gap. Many Edwardian cafés were richly decorated buildings, marketed as modern, hygienic, and chic. Leicester’s Turkey Café, with its dazzling façade, fitted this bill, and did so with considerable style.


For more about W J Neatby, see my post here.

Charterhouse Street, London

Fox and anchor and peacock and…

Here is one other example of the buildings adorned with interesting lettering seen on the Routemaster bus tour mentioned in the previous post. This is the Fox and Anchor pub near Smithfield Market, a façade in which architecture, decoration, and lettering are united to create one of the most remarkable examples of London Art Nouveau. The unity comes largely from the use of Doulton tiles specially designed by W J Neatby.

William James Neatby is famous for his work for Doulton’s architectural ceramics department in the late-Victorian period. His best known decorative schemes were done in the 1890s and the first few years of the 20th century. Stylized foliage, elegant figures, and curvaceous lettering flow around his buildings in a framework of ceramic mouldings and shafts. At their best, they unite architecture and decoration in an exciting and uplifting way.

Neatby’s career-path was interesting and unusual. From age 15, he trained as an architect, working as an articled pupil in a practice in Yorkshire before starting as an architect in and around Whitby. When he was 23 he changed direction, going to work for Burmantoft’s in Leeds as a designer of ceramic tiles and after six years there he went in 1890 to Doulton’s in Lambeth as their head of architectural ceramics. At both Burmantoft’s and Doulton’s Neatby delved deeply into the art and craft of ceramics, developing new processes and creating stunning designs. He created decorative schemes for many prominent buildings – his interiors include the Meat Hall in Harrods and the Winter Gardens in Blackpool, while the Everard’s factory in Bristol and the Royal Arcade, Norwich, are among his best exterior schemes.

Even a small building like the Fox and Anchor could benefit from the full Neatby treatment. The fox and anchor of the pub’s name are painted on to the tiles in the gable. Further down there are grotesques like the gargoyles of Notre Dame, a beautiful frieze of peacocks, and ornate Art Nouveau lettering. Grinning heads peep out from keystones above windows. The narrow interior also looks atmospheric and full of period details. But the lettering tour was moving swiftly on to the joys of Edmund Martin, tripe dressers, whose stylish 1930s lettering was partly hidden behind a builder’s hoarding, so I did not have time to sample the interior or its wares. I must return.


Fox & Anchor, detail showing lettering, peacock, and grotesque

Norwich

Rich Nouveau... 

Many shopping arcades were built in English towns and cities in the last three decades of the 19th century. They provided elegant shopping for the prosperous middle classes of late-Victorian England and their sheltered indoor walks afforded a protected environment away from the mud and mess of the streets. Cities such as Manchester and Leeds acquired large arcades, but many smaller cities had at least one example to attract the well heeled.

Norwich, for example. The Royal Arcade was built in 1899 on ground previously occupied by the yard of the Royal Hotel. The front entrance is through the old hotel building, but for the rest of the arcade its architect, George Skipper, produced something dramatically different. This was a time when the curvaceous flair of Art Nouveau was adding something fresh to Victorian design, and arcades, with their ironwork and tiled decoration lent themselves well to this new style. So Skipper gave the Royal Arcade a strong, high-arched ‘rear’ entrance and a delicate glazed roof to flood the interior with light.


The true stroke of genius was in employing one of the best designers at Doulton’s, W J Neatby, to do the tilework. A mass of Art Nouveau patterning, foliate detail, and lettering greets the visitor at Skipper’s entrance. Lavish peacocks enliven the interior. An atmosphere combining lightness with richness is the result – there is jewel-like colour to make the shopper feel good, and plenty of light to show off the goods. No wonder it has lasted so well.