Newcastle Breweries and the Bruce Building
By Suzanne and Bryan Stanley
The red sandstone Bruce Building, with its little copper dome, is such a familiar part of the old Percy Street landscape that I’ve never given a thought to its interior. It was a pleasurable surprise therefore to step inside this Grade II Listed building on one of the Heritage Open Days.
Designed as Head Office for Newcastle Breweries Ltd by local architect Joseph Oswald, it was built between 1896 and 1900. It is very much of its period, the typical but outstanding internal feature being the heavily moulded faience tiles, in buff, russet, yellow and turquoise, from the famous Burmantofts (Leeds) factory. They’re as smooth to the touch as if molten chocolate had been poured over them. They’re used to great effect in the entrance hall and in the clerks’ and accountants’ room with its arcading and three fireplaces. Sadly only one of these still has its roundel displaying the interlaced company initials. With mahogany doors, panelling and upstairs fireplaces, oak flooring, decorative plaster ceilings, a marble staircase, mosaic floors and stained glass, the company provided a very ornate and luxurious working environment. There were technical fecilities too: the building generated its own electricity, and set into each chimney breast is a vent and a control panel. These are now heavily painted over, but the words “warm”, “fresh air supply” and the name “Ashwell and Nesbit” (a Leicester firm of heating and ventilating engineers) are just legible. Of the remaining original furniture, one massive mahogany cabinet conceals a safe.
Much of the cavernous and manyroomed basement is shelved – in timber for document storage, and in stone for wine and spirits. There is also a coal store (still containing a gritty residue) for the many fireplaces. In the stairwell a black line marks the height of floodwater on September 6th 1913. I haven’t yet explored this further. Though the wine and spirits are long gone, the basement is currently host to numerous geological specimens from the University which add to the interest.
The building was compulsorily purchased by the University of Durham in the 1950s in order to extend King’s College, and has been used as teaching and research accommodation by Newcastle University until recently. It is mentioned in Pevsner’s Buildings of England, features in the University’s SINE Project, and is briefly described in a report by the Brewery History Society to English Heritage (Strategy for the Historic Industrial Environment: the brewing industry. 2010). From that report I gather that Tyneside has lost almost everything related to its brewing history, so the Bruce Building, associated as it is with such a prestigious brewery, is a cherished survival.
The University Estates Office would like to add to its information about the building, and would welcome contact from anyone with factual or anecdotal information or historical photographs.
City and County
November 2011
