The Old Library, Avenue Road ? new life as apartments

Image: © Robin Stott Taken: 16 Dec 2013

The conversion of the former Leamington Library nears completion. Nearby streets have been clogged with tradesmen's cars and vans for months. Some fancy landscaping is being installed. It was built by Leamington Corporation and officially opened in 1902 as the Municipal Schools and Public Library. As well as the Public Library and a School of Art it housed the Technical School and the Secondary School for boys and girls, institutions that had occupied a number of other premises in the town. Under the Education Act of 1902 the County Council took over secondary education. By 1922 the schools had become cramped. The boys moved to Leamington College for Boys in Binswood Avenue; the girls remained at Avenue Road as the Leamington College for Girls. I have this idea that they later moved over to Aylesford School in Warwick. A small museum moved from the Town Hall to the Library in 1915. An Art Gallery extension was added to the library in 1928. In 2000 all these public facilities were successfully rehoused in the restored and extended Royal Pump Rooms on the Parade. The library and art gallery buildings passed into the control of Warwickshire College of Further Education, I believe, before being sold for conversion into apartments. Its uncertain future was noted by Colin Craig in 2009 http://www.geograph.org.uk/p/1210824

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