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University of Bristol- Architecture Print Tea Towel

University of Bristol- Architecture Print Tea Towel

Description

Wills Memorial Building Bristol no 5. in a series

The Wills Memorial Building looms up from the top of Park Street in Queen’s Road, Bristol. Designed in 1912 by Sir George Oatley, it was one of the last magnificent Gothic buildings to be constructed in Britain.

The building was commissioned and funded by Sir George A Wills and Mr Henry Herbert Wills, the tobacco magnates, in honour of their father, Henry Overton Wills III, benefactor and first Chancellor of Bristol University. The building is not without controversy, as the Wills family had made their fortune from slave-grown tobacco from the American Republic. However, they later became public advocates for the abolition of slavery.

Construction began in 1915, but work was delayed by World War I and the building was eventually completed and opened in 1925 by King George V and Queen Mary. In November 1940 the Great Hall, including its impressive Hammer-beam roof, was destroyed by a German incendiary bomb. It was restored in the 1960s, almost exactly to Oatley’s original design. The building is constructed of Bath and Clipsham stone in the Perpendicular Gothic style. The tower stands at 215 feet, and the octagonal lantern at the top contains the bell, Great George, which weighs 9.5 tonnes and is struck on the hour as well as being tolled on important occasions. It was the fourth biggest bell in the UK when installed.

The Wills Memorial Building was once described by the architectural historian Sir Nikolaus Pevsner as “a tour de force in Gothic Revival, so convinced, so vast, and so competent that one cannot help feeling respect for it”.

Designed, printed and manufactured in the UK. The dark red colour is Pantone 187- Bristol University Red.

100% cotton

No overseas sweatshops or nasty things were involved at any point in the making of this tea towel.

Added on Oct 11, 2009