Lillington Library, Lillington, UK

Architect	Henry Fedeski of Fedeski and Rayner Architects
Date Built	1959-60
Location	Valley Rd, Leamington Spa CV32 7SJ
Description
Lillington Library is a Grade II Listed branch library building designed by Henry Fedeski and built by George Wimpey and Co. It achieved listed status because, 1. "... the library is a good example of the first wave of post-war building of branch libraries, and is in a lively, colourful Festival of Britain style, with good massing and design" 2. "... aside from a sensitive, small extension, the exterior, which is the most significant element of the building, is unaltered" 3. It is regarded as part of a group of buildings "... with the adjacent Roman Catholic church of Our Lady (Grade II), which was built almost simultaneously with the library, to designs by the same architect, forming a coherent hub for the new suburb they were constructed to serve." An interesting feature of the building is the so-called "Fly-away" upper storey which, as the article below explains, was home to the branch librarian. The building was described at the time of its listing as being of, " ... brick and concrete construction, in two blocks: a long, single-storey range running left to right, housing the public areas of the library, with concrete beams supporting the flats which form the upper storey of the two-storey range running front-to-back and slightly oversailing what was formerly the centre of the now seven-bay range. The ground floor is glazed to full height, with aluminium frames, under a flat roof. The end walls are built from coursed, hammer-dressed Hornton stone. The entrance bay, which forms the ground floor of the front-to-rear range, tips outwards to carry the overhanging first floor, and is flanked by polished Broughton Moor slate panels. Above, the three-window cross wing has a low-pitched, gabled roof clad in copper; the breezeblock is clad in a checker-board pattern of alternating light- and dark-coloured aggregate panels."