User:Ratarsed/Architecture of Ipswich

Ipswich is home to some fine examples of architecture funded by the wealth brought to the town by the cloth trade and the port, being home to the youngest Grade I listed building, Norman Foster's Willis Building as well as buildings going right the way back as far as the 14th Century with the churches of St. Nicholas and St. Peter.

Medieval buildings
Little remains of Ipswich's Norman buildings, with a few churches being the only providing physical remains, and even then, they have often been restored or partially rebuilt more recently, however 14th Century portions still remain in the churches of St. Nicholas and St. Peter

Buildings do survive from the later medieval periods, such as the Ancient House which dates originally to the 15th Century, as well as early timber framed buildings of Soane St, Fore St and Silent St.

Cardinal Wolsey established a college in Ipswich in 1528, however all that remains of it is a brick gateway by St. Mary's church

Christchurch Mansion was built between 1548 and 1550 on the site of the Augustinian Priory of Holy Trinity for a London merchant, Paul Withipoll and his son, Edmund.

Tudor/Elizabethan era
Buttermarket, Back Hamlet, Bolton Lane, Dial Lane, Fore St, Lower Brook St. Northgate St., St. Nicholas St, St. Margrets Plain, St. Peters St, Tavern St.

Pubs: Mannings, Spread Eagle, Sorrel Horse Inn, Swan Inn, Halbred Inn, Plough Inn

Great White Horse Hotel

Gypeswyk Hall

Stuart era
The Unitarian Meeting House, built between 1699 and 1700 is regarded as one of the best examples of Stuart architecture in England

The Chantry

Georgian era
Goldrood House

Anglesea Rd, Berners St., High St, Orwell Place, Queens St., Tower St.

County House designed by W McIntosh Brooks in the Tudor style 1836

Unicorn Inn

Victorian era
Fonnereau Road has a good variety of late Georgian and early Victorian styles, with debassed classical terraces at the foot, continuing in a Italianate style as well as Jacobean

Old Custom House 1844, by J.M.Clark

Ipswich's original museum was custom built, unusual for its time, in 1847 by Christopher Fleury of Ipswich. Grecisan style. Fleury also was the architect for the current building of Elizabethan styled Ipswich School. The replacement and current building, which is built in a 17th Century style, was the result of a design competition in 1881, won by Horace Cheston. .

Twentieth century
After the First World War, large council estates were built on the fringes of Ipswich in the areas now known as:
 * Racecourse estate -- 1920 built on the former Ipswich Racecourse
 * Gainsborough estate -- 1926
 * Priory Heath -- 1935
 * Whitton -- 1936

During the 1950s an 1960s there were huge changes to the town was swathes of old housing cleared for road schemes and bold new developments such as Civic Drive and commercial development as part of ambitious plans to treble the population. This era saw the start of the Chantry Estate and the Castle Hill Estate

The town has always been fairly open minded and progressive, with projects such as the Greyfriars complex by Edward Skipper & Associates built from 1964 - 1966 on the site of the Franciscan friary. Originally the complex was intended to move the town centre further south, with a mix of shops, offices and flats. However, the scheme was not as successful as originally planned and little remains of the Greyfriars complex following demolition work in the early 1990s which only left St. Francis Tower (residential tower), St. Clare House (office tower) and multi-storey car park intact.

Twenty-first century
More recently volume builders have been building houses with a more contemporary feel in the town, partly in response to the television series, The Perfect Home, in which Bellway were approached and encouraged to be more progressive on the Ravenswood estate.