Harris Museum

Monthly visitor numbers have reportedly more than doubled since its re-opening. Like other publicly funded museums in the United Kingdom, The Harris does not charge visitors for admission, although visitors are requested to make a donation if they are able.

• Name — Harris Museum • Location — Market Square, Preston PR1 2PP United Kingdom • Type — Art Gallery and Public Library • Visitors — 345,258 annually (pre-2025 re-opening) • Public Transit — Preston Bus Station Preston Railway Station • Leader Type — Assistant Director • Leader — Tim Joel • Website — https: www.theharris.org.uk/

In the 19th century, it became legal to raise money for libraries by local taxation, and the town of Preston wanted a grand museum and library for its inhabitants. From 1850, local people held fund-raising events; and in 1877 Edmund Robert Harris, a Preston lawyer, left in his will £300,000 to establish a trust and support a public library, museum and art gallery with Preston Corporation. In 1879, the first Preston lending library was set up in the Town Hall basement, while a public museum was set up on Cross Street, opening 1 May 1880. Success led the council to erect a new building for both. Work started on the museum in 1882 during the Preston Guild, and it officially opened in 1893.

The building was designed by a local architect, James Hibbert, who chose a Neo-Classical style. For the 1880s, this was in some ways contrary to the Gothic Revival style which was popular at the time and features in numerous contemporary buildings in Preston, including the old Town Hall which stood on the western side of the Harris.

The building's exterior reflects Hibbert's vision of a neo-classicism through "simplicity, symmetry of plan, truthfulness of expression and refinement of detail". Unlike other public buildings designed in this style (such as the British Museum in London and the Konzerthaus in Berlin), Hibbert's design does not feature steps leading up from the Flag Market but instead has ground-level entrances on each side of the building. A pediment dominates the front of the building and features a sculpture based upon Raphael's painting The School of Athens. Interpreting Hibbert's design fell to London sculptor Edwin Roscoe Mullins and features the central figure of the Ancient Athenian general Pericles, surrounded by twelve other men arranged symmetrically to either side. The sculpture is considered Mullins' principal work. Beneath the pediment is the inscription To Literature, Arts and Science. There are further inscriptions along the sides, including "on Earth there is nothing great but man: in man there is nothing great but mind." On the lantern tower a quotation in Ancient Greek from Pericles' Funeral Oration. Supporting the pediment are six Ionic fluted columns leading down to a raised portico overlooking the Flag Market.

The building's interior is dominated by a central hall rising over 120 feet from the ground floor to the ceiling of the lantern tower. As well as the ground floor, there are three upper floors with balconies opening up onto the central hall, and collection halls and exhibition spaces on each floor. The interior design features classical influences from Ancient Greece, Assyria and Egypt, including columns and mosaic floors, and copies of Classical and Renaissance sculpture representing the "whole range and history of the world's greatest achievements in art". Only the Greek and Assyrian friezes on the upper floors and the copy of Lorenzo Ghiberti's Gates of Paradise on the ground floor remain of the original sculptures.

The building also houses Preston City's Public Library, which is run by Lancashire County Council. The first librarian of the Harris Free Public Library was a William Bramwell who retired in 1916 aged eighty-one. The Harris library holds important book collections including the Shepherd Collection donated to Preston by Dr Richard Shepherd in 1761, with additions funded by the Shepherd bequest, local studies material, nineteenth-century journals, rare books and art books. Also the Spencer collection of illustrated children's books and chapbooks. At the time of the opening of the Harris, William Bramwell was also the librarian of the Dr Shepherd Library which found a home at the Harris having been located in various buildings and institutions across the town.

• Illustration — The Harris • Illustration — Detail of the sculptures above the columns • Illustration — The front of the building, as seen from the Flag Market • Illustration — The pediment, with the central figure of Pericles • Illustration — The entrance and rotunda from the first floor • Illustration — The gallery entrances from the first floor landing • Illustration — The skylight pyramid at the top of the main atrium • Illustration — West Front of Antwerp Cathedral by David Roberts, 1847 • Illustration — At the Opera by William Powell Frith, 1855 • Illustration — In the Bey's Garden, by John Frederick Lewis, in the museum • Illustration — Copy of The Gates of Paradise - the east doors of The Florence Baptistery. • Illustration — In the Golden Olden Time, by John Atkinson Grimshaw, oil on canvas, c1870 • Illustration — Scapa Flow by B. F. Gribble, depicting the surrender of the German High Seas Fleet at Scapa Flow on 18 November 1918, oil on canvas, 1920 • Illustration — Blue hour photograph of the Harris Museum taken in the morning 5 March 2022

Following a successful bid for support from the National Lottery Heritage Fund, in October 2020 plans were submitted for a £10.7M renovation and restoration project called #HarrisYourPlace with the aim "to establish the Harris as the UK’s first blended museum, art gallery and library". The project is said to include "much-needed conservation works" on the roof, stonework and basement to help address the building's "long-standing damp problem". It will also reveal some of the Harris’ original architectural details which have been hidden by previous building works, including reopening an original entrance way to improve accessibility. A new lift and toilet on the ground floor will improve the building's accessibility to disabled visitors, and a new staircase will replace the existing fire exit stairs. These proposed works are in addition to a £150K Children's Place scheme scheduled to open in 2024, which will redevelop the children's library space and improve facilities for school groups and families.

The Harris features in the Preston version of Monopoly, launched in October 2020.