Guidebook celebrates Leeds’ vibrant campus

The rich architectural heritage of the University of Leeds is explored in a new edition of a classic walking guide to its campus. “Walks Round Red Brick” by the late Maurice Beresford has established itself as the definitive source on the University’s buildings and open spaces since it was published in 1980. The new edition overseen by Chris Hammond, Life Fellow in Material Science at Leeds, brings Beresford’s classic up to date, adding revised histories and notes on the latest additions to the University’s architecture. Photographs by Ruth Baumberg document the campus’ contemporary sights. “Professor Beresford wanted to remind members of the University that they were surrounded in their daily work by a ‘free open-air museum of architectural and social history’ and I think that holds as true today as it ever did,” Hammond said ahead the book launch on March 12. “Unlike many big city universities, the Leeds campus has a consistent plan—it is designed so the pedestrian can move around in it—but it also has great diversity, from the 19th century gothic redbrick of the Great Hall, to the Portland Stone era of the 1920s to 1950s exemplified by the Parkinson Building to the great statements of the 1960s—the E.C. Stoner building and Chancellor’s Court,” Hammond said. “There have been many such grand schemes.