Ernest Prestwich

Ernest Prestwich (29 August 1889 – 4 November 1977) was an English architect, working his own interpretation of Classical architecture, via the Style Moderne, Modernist and Brutalist styles. He specialised in war memorials and civic buildings, many of which are listed buildings. Some of his designs were independently-designed projects, and some were co-designs with colleagues. He was a partner with his father James Caldwell Prestwich and his brother Harold in Prestwich & Sons. and he also worked under his own name, and with Percy Thomas in various civic building design competitions.

Background Prestwich was born into an architectural background. His father was James Caldwell Prestwich, architect Lewyn James Prestwich, and Ministry of Labour clerk Herbert Webb Prestwich.

Prestwich was born on 29 August 1889, in Leigh, Lancashire. By 1901 the family had moved to 73 St Helen's Road, Leigh. He does not appear on the 1911 census.

After attending Manchester Grammar School, he was accepted at the University of Liverpool School of Architecture, and studied there between 1906 and 1912, gaining his Bachelor of Arts with first class honours in architecture in 1910, and Master of Arts in 1912. He also won the Ronald P. Jones Scholarship "for the study of architecture in Rome". The 1921 census finds Prestwich at age 30, living with his parents and working in Leigh with his father. Between 1923 and 1939, Prestwich was based in Leigh.

Career

Between 1912 and 1965, Prestwich was an employee and then a partner in his father's and brother's company J.C. Prestwich & Son, which in 1922 became Prestwich & Sons. He was also for a while an employee of Lever Brothers, working under James Lomax-Simpson in the company's architectural department. There he collaborated on a project in Stornoway where he designed alterations to the ballroom of Lews Castle, including an "Adam-style ceiling", and other works in Cheshire and Thornton Hough.

Prestwich remained a partner of J.C. Prestwich & Sons, while working under the company name, as an individual architect, and as a design-competition partner of Percy Thomas. At the same time he took additional tasks. In 1936 he was appointed as "consultant in relation to the architectural features of the Central Baths to be erected at Clare Hall, Halifax". In 1932 he was appointed to the jury panel which chose the winner of West Yorkshire's Best Building Medal Award for that year. In 1939 he was made a panel architect, appointed to survey buildings in his locality in respect of protective measures during the Second World War.

Early in his career, while still a student, Prestwich was the winner of a 1910 competition "to plan the completion of W. H. Lever's model village at Port Sunlight". He was awarded a total of £120 for winning the competition and for the use of the plan by Lever. The Builder published his designs, which were also exhibited at the Royal Academy in the same year. A number of his architectural briefs for civic buildings, war memorials and churches were won by competition. Besides being a competitor in building design competitions, Prestwich was also a recommended architect-assessor in such competitions. Explaining his use of the Style Moderne, Prestwich said that:

War service Prestwich served as a private in the Royal Army Service Corps. He disembarked in France on 5 September 1915, according to his medal index card. Later, he was an acting sergeant in the Royal Engineers. He was demobilised from the army, and transferred to Class Z Reserve on 21 February 1919.

He was organising the building of external air raid shelters for the schools of Widnes, and calling for builders and contractors, in 1941.

General works Prestwich designed the Cinematograph Theatre, Railway Road, Leigh, Lancashire, in 1912, It was completed in 1913.

Swinton Town Hall was co-designed by Prestwich with Percy Thomas. They won the design competition in September 1934, and the building was opened in 1938. It was renamed as Salford Civic Centre in 1974. The building was designed with a public hall, petty sessions court, public library and municipal offices, besides committee rooms, a council chamber, and administrative offices. The exterior is of "brick with Portland stone dressings", and includes a clock tower. In that year, the R.I.B.A. recommended six architects for the job, and Prestwich was chosen by the reputation of his previous plans for Swinton, Pendlebury, Northampton, Tunbridge Wells and Leigh. The civic centre plans included the Benn Memorial Hall, intended to seat 1,500. In December 1937 Prestwich's plan was approved, at an estimated £90,478 , in spite of objections as to cost. By the end of the year, plans were being modified to lower the cost. However, by November 1938 no foundation stone had been laid, the council and populace were still arguing about the cost of the scheme, and a ministerial inquiry was held in relation to the required loans. Prestwich was the only witness called, to "explain details of the scheme". The Rugby Advertiser devoted a whole page to the matter. It was ultimately completed to the original design and opened as the "New Town Hall" on 5 July 1961 by Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother.

Pendlebury Town Hall, Salford, Lancashire, was designed by Prestwich, with Percy Thomas, and was completed in 1938.

Tunbridge Wells Civic Complex comprises several listed buildings. It includes Tunbridge Wells Town Hall, and was initiated as a design competition which was won in November 1934 by Prestwich and Percy Thomas, Much of it was completed in 1939, with the town hall being opened in 1941. An initial drawing by Prestwich and Thomas was published in the Kent & Sussex Courier in November 1934. When the design competition was won, the estimated total cost of this complex and the town hall complex was £157,550 18s 5d . The cost later rose to £200,000 and comprised a library, fire station, police courts, public assembly hall, and municipal buildings.

Tunbridge Wells assembly hall was opened on 24 May 1939 by Lady Joan Marion Pratt, Marchioness Camden, wife of the Lord Lieutenant of Kent. It was built between 1934 and 1939, and is a listed building in its own right. The group of Tunbridge Wells police station, courts and library, completed in 1939, comprises two listed buildings. The style is described by English Heritage as "Neo-Georgian style with Moderne details". The police station and courts building is also in brown brick, but has Portland stone dressings. Its bronze main doors have above them a "semicircular tympanum with classical figures with scales of justice and motto, do well doubt not.

The Mounts group comprises a listed building. Northampton Police and Fire Stations and Courts were designed by Prestwich as a civic centre in 1931 and completed in 1935. He designed and completed Mounts Baths at Northampton in 1936, although one source suggests that all of these buildings were constructed between 1938 and 1941.

In the 1950s, Prestwich was designing churches. Didsbury Methodist Church, Parrs Wood Road, Didsbury, was designed by Prestwich and opened in October 1954. Peterlee Memorial Church, a Methodist church, was designed by Prestwich, and built between 1957 and 1958. Prestwich designed the Methodist church at Court Hey, Broadgreen, Liverpool, and it was opened when he was in his 69th year, on 19 July 1958, However it was demolished in 1966 to make way for the M62 motorway. One of Prestwich's last designs was The Manse, for the Methodist Church, Bonner Road, Bethnal Green, London. It was completed in 1959. Knowsley House, designed by Prestwich at an unknown date, is a former office building. It now houses shops on Deansgate and Knowsley Street, Bolton.

Leigh Cenotaph, 1922

This is a listed building. The cenotaph at Leigh was a competition win by Prestwich, and completed in 1922. It stands in a memorial garden, on a wide, stepped platform or stylobate, and is built in a stylised, Modernist, form of the Classical style. It carries two bronze plaques, with the names of the fallen, and the plaques are framed by wreaths and columns. The words, Our Glorious Dead, are engraved on the cornice of the monument. On the top of the structure is a "stylised coffin bearing crosses and wreath", in stone. On the sides of the monument are "sculptured swords and bronze pikes". This monument has been adapted to record the fallen from both World Wars.

Blackpool war memorial, 1922–1923 This is a listed building. Blackpool war memorial, with sculpture by Gilbert Ledward, was designed by Prestwich and completed in 1923. After the design was accepted in 1921, it was described as a " obelisk in the centre of an oblong enclosure with circular ends, to be placed in the southern sunken garden of the Princess Parade, between the Hotel Metropole and the North Pier". The cost was projected at £15,000 .

Harrogate war memorial, 1922–1923

This is a listed building. Harrogate war memorial, which stands in Prospect Square, Harrogate, North Yorkshire, was designed by Prestwich in 1923, with sculpture by Ledward. It is tall.

Bennetthorpe war memorial, Doncaster, 1923

This is a listed building, standing at the entrance to Elmfield Park in Doncaster. In 1921, Prestwich designed Bennetthorpe war memorial, also known as Doncaster memorial, at Roman Road and South Parade, Doncaster, and it was completed in 1923. It stands at high, and was paid for, mostly by subscription, at a cost of £1,533 . A procession marched from the Mansion House, headed by the 5th K.O.Y.L.I., with band playing, followed by the Yorkshire Dragoons, ex-servicemen, and the borough police with their chief constable. This was followed by a civic procession, with a mace bearer, mayor and ex-mayor, the town council, then magistrates, council officials, clergy and ministers, and last of all the townspeople.

Institutions and awards Prestwich was elected associate of the Royal Institute of British Architects (A.R.I.B.A.), and fellow (F.R.I.B.A.) in 1918 and 1928 respectively. In 1938 he received the RIBA Architecture Bronze Medal for Manchester.