This is the main entrance to the one of the original university buildings, now just a generic university building, with offices and classrooms. I thought this was the original building of Institute for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, the wonderful original name of what is now the University of Central Lancashire, but n doing a bit of research, and thinking about it, I realised that this building dates from 1897 (as you can see from the date on the top right window), almost seventy years after the original institute was founded.
The building was commissioned by what had become by then the Harris Institute in part to commemorate the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria in 1867, and it was officially known as the Victoria Jubilee Technical School. Now it’s just the plain old Harris building, and although it has a lovely doorway and an impressive staircase, and there are some stained glass transoms on the first-floor windows, it’s just a generic university building, with its main annoyance being that it’s a long hike from here to the nearest coffee shop.
I love stained-glass windows like this, and the stately architecture that always surrounds them.