Pitt Building, Cambridge University Press, by Edward Blore

Pitt Building, Cambridge University Press

Edward Blore (1787-1879)

1831, with 1930s alterations

Ashlar-faced

Trumpington Street, Cambridge CB2 1RB

This stately three-storey listed building has an elegant Gothic oriel over its main entrance, battlements, crocketed pinnacles and a central tower with openwork parapet. The interior of the oriel room, where the Press Syndicate still holds its meetings, is particularly attractive. Named after William Pitt the younger, once MP for Cambridge, the Pitt Building is now used as a conference/training centre. (Commentary continued below.)

Photograph and text by Jacqueline Banerjee, 2011/12.

[You may use this photograph without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the photographer and (2) link your document to this URL or cite the Victorian Web in a print document.]

Reginald Turnor describes it as "enormously more pleasant than anything by [George Gilbert] Scott or [Alfred] Waterhouse" (53). It is indeed "enormously ... pleasant," but this seems unfair to (for example) Scott's beautiful St John's College Chapel or even Waterhouse's Pembroke College Library (though that kind of High Victorian Gothic was very much out of fashion in the 1950s when Turnor was writing).

Related Material

Richard Westmacott's statue of Pitt outside Pembroke College Library

Sources

"Cambridge University Press (Pitt Press), Cambridge." British Listed Buildings. Web. 9 July 2012.

"The Pitt Building: Oriel Room" (gives a virtual tour of the room for promotional purposes). Cambridge University Press. Web. 9 July 2012.

Turnor, Reginald. Nineteenth Century Architecture in Britain. London: Batsford, 1950. Print.

Last modified 9 July 2012