Ipswich Museum
The town's municipal Museum, which started life on the
'kink' in Museum
Street (and whose original building, empty for so long, is now
Arlington's Restaurant) in 1854 - one
of
the first such museums in the country - clearly wanted to promote the
twin
Victorian achievements of art and science. The
architecture is described as in the "Queen Anne-style". The terra cotta frontage of
the
'new' Ipswich Museum built by J.B. and F. Bennett of Ipswich displays a
feast of swags, floral and fossil mouldings, false pillars and framed
sections
packed with motifs of the scientist and artist. Portraits of Isaac
Newton
and William Hogarth peer oddly from dish-shaped roundels on the gables.
(Close-up photography of all these features would, we feel, help in the
appreciation of this decoration.) The weathering has played down some
details
in the modelling and emphasised others in bright orange-red,
particularly
the date at the top of the facade: '1880'. The High Street Museum
opened officially on the red letter day of 27 July 1881, the day on
which the new southern lock into the Wet Dock – close to the
brewery – and the decorative Post Office on Cornhill were also opened. Perhaps they
thought it
unnecessary
to actually name the building 'in stone' as every local would know that
it was a temple of learning and artistic endeavour.
-
The right-hand wing, which stands well back from the
High Street, bears
this grand scrolled cartouche in the centre:
'SCIENCE & ART SCHOOLS'
in an idiosyncratic florid script. Again,
the
weathering adds colour and interest. These three studio rooms were
built
in 1890 as an addition to the museum for the exploration of art and
science
utilising the resources next door.
-
Reading the words 'Art' and 'Schools' brings up another
long neglected building
which adjoins this one. The old School of Art and Design next door was
opened
in 1934 and provided space and well-lit studios for artists for many
years.
(The unfinished appearance of the outer walls is due to the fact that
the
planned doubling in size of the art school was prevented by the onset
of
the Second World War.) The Ipswich School of Art has some famous names
associated with it, notably Colin Moss and Maggi Hambling. The building
became the Suffolk Institute of Technology in
2004 and in 2010 a Saatchi-sponsored art gallery.
Between 1887 and 1924, the Borough of Ipswich Victoria Free Library
('Free' to indicate the borrowers' free access to the books, rather
than having to request them at a counter) was situated in the museum in
High Street. It moved to Central Library:
the new Carnegie building in Northgate Street in 1924.
Reading
The story of Ipswich Museum is well told, with many illustrations in
the
book: 'A Rhino in the High Street' by R.A.D. Markham (Ipswich Borough
Council,
1990).
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throughout the Ipswich
Historic Lettering site: Borin Van Loon
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