In 1997, all 43 student study-bedrooms on K staircase were refurbished with en-suite WCs and showers, the first such conversion in Queens’.
CITIES SKYLINES ALL BUILDINGS HISTORICAL WINDOWS
And whereas we now object to the fashion of slit windows which are no use to the inhabitants of the rooms, people then objected to the sheerness of the blocks which we now bless when such wild excesses are committed everywhere in outlines and skylines. Yet this seems now, ten years later, such a harmless building, well sited and not in the least clashing with the Victorian and Edwardian buildings with which it forms a court. When Sir Basil Spence’s E RASMUS B UILDING was designed and illustrated and went up in 1959–61, there was great commotion over this desecration by a modernistic building of part of an ancient site and of the river view from the Backs. The formal opening ceremony was performed by the Patroness of the College, the Queen Mother, on Monday 5th June 1961. The tiny gyp-rooms were little more than a row of gas burners and a sink: they later proved to be inadequately sized when refrigerators needed to be accommodated. Communal bathrooms, WCs, and gyp-rooms were placed on north-facing elevations, both in K and in L. The door-frames, etc., were of afrormosia. The floors of the corridors and rooms were made of polished strips of afzelia. Originally, on the corridor side, the rooms had built-in furniture, comprising wardrobe, concealed wash-basin, and bookcase, in a dark hardwood veneer. To make up for the loss of the fireplace, an electric fire was fitted in each room, topped by a stone shelf, which also concealed the finned tube of the central heating. It was the first student accommodation in Queens’ to have central heating (fed from boilers in the basement of Dokett Building), and thus no chimneys or fireplaces in the rooms. The Erasmus Building is unlike many traditional Cambridge college buildings in being designed internally on a corridor principle, fed by only two staircases. The original 5-storey design had a prominent copper-clad staircase, the vestigial remains of which can be seen in the copper cladding of the roof housing of staircase K. Two shades of red brick are used: darker for the piers, and lighter for the elevations. It was occupied for the first time in October 1960.
CITIES SKYLINES ALL BUILDINGS HISTORICAL PLUS
The Erasmus Building originally contained 43 study-bedrooms for students, plus two sets and a study for Fellows. The idea of placing the building on a colonnade is not new to this College as Cloister Court is treated in this way, and indeed I can say that the seed for the architectural idea rests in Cloister Court, which was very closely studied for character and rhythms before this building was designed. Contextualisationĭespite being of modernist tradition, the design deliberately references features of the college around it. The existing garden wall shown in the model passing under the building was in fact replaced by a new, lower, wall. One of the changes from earlier designs was to omit taking staircase L up to the roof. As far as can be discovered, there was no public reaction to this scheme. This design received approval from the Royal Fine Art Commission and from the Governing Body. The final design, in a 3D scale model of college, as published in December 1958.