{{Short description|Library in Manchester, England}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2026}} {{Use British English|date=April 2026}} {{Infobox building | name = The Portico Library | image = Portico Library, Manchester.jpg | image_size = | alt = Sandstone library in the Greek Revival style | caption = The Portico Library in 2011 | pushpin_map = Greater Manchester | location = Mosley Street,<br />Manchester, England | coordinates = {{coord|53|28|47|N|2|14|25|W|type:landmark|display=inline,title}} | years_built = 1802–1806 | website = {{URL|https://www.theportico.org.uk/}} | designations = {{Designation list | embed = yes | designation1 = Grade II* Listed Building | designation1_offname = The Portico Library<br />and The Bank public house | designation1_date = 25 February 1952 | designation1_number = {{NHLE|num=1197930|short=y|postscript=none}} }} }}
'''The Portico Library''', '''The Portico''' or '''Portico Library and Gallery''' on Mosley Street in Manchester, England, is an independent subscription library designed in the Greek Revival style by Thomas Harrison of Chester and built between 1802 and 1806.<ref name="Hartwell" /> It is recorded in the National Heritage List for England as a Grade II* listed building, having been designated on 25 February 1952,<ref name="EH" /> and has been described as "the most refined little building in Manchester".<ref name="Frangopulo1977" />
==History== [[File:Portico_Library_Manchester_Blue_Plaque,_1806.jpg|thumb|right|Blue plaque outside the Portico Library naming Thomas Harrison, Richard Cobden, John Dalton, Elizabeth Gaskell, Robert Peel, Thomas De Quincey and Peter Mark Roget as readers at the library]] The library was established as a result of a meeting of Manchester businessmen in 1802 which resolved to found an "institute uniting the advantages of a newsroom and a library". A visit by four of the men to the Athenaeum in Liverpool inspired them to achieve a similar institution in Manchester. Money was raised through 400 subscriptions from Manchester men and the library opened in 1806.
The library, mainly focused on 19th-century literature, was designed by Thomas Harrison, architect of Liverpool's Lyceum and built by one of the founders, David Bellhouse. Its first secretary, Peter Mark Roget, began his thesaurus here.
Today the ground floor is tenanted by ''The Bank'', a public house that takes its name from the Bank of Athens that leased the property in 1921. The library occupies what became the first floor with its entrance on Charlotte Street.<ref name="History" />
In November 2023, it was announced that the library had been awarded a £453,000 grant from the National Lottery Heritage Fund to transform the building and preserve its book collection. The regeneration project would aim to unite all three original floors of the building for the first time in more than 100 years. The ground floor and basement would be changed to a "northern bookshop" with educational activities, dining and exhibition areas and meeting spaces, while the upper floors would showcase the library's unique book collection, manuscript archive and architecture.<ref>{{cite news |date=29 November 2023 |title=Historic Manchester library wins £453k grant for revamp |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-manchester-67558070 |work=BBC News |location=Manchester |access-date=23 February 2024}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Brown |first=Mark |date=29 December 2023 |title=218-year-old library above Manchester pub prepares for £7m redevelopment |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/dec/29/218-year-old-library-above-manchester-pub-prepares-for-7m-redevelopment |work=The Guardian |access-date=29 December 2023}}</ref>
==Architecture== thumb|left|The sign above the entrance to the library The library was the first Greek Revival building in the city. Its interior was inspired by John Soane.<ref name="Hartwell" /> The library has a rectangular plan and is constructed in sandstone ashlar on a corner site at 57 Mosley Street. It has two storeys, a basement and roof space. Its façade on Mosley Street has a three-bay pedimented loggia with four Ionic columns set slightly forward and steps between the columns. Under the loggia are two entrance doors and three square windows at first floor level.<ref name="EH"/>
The Charlotte Street façade has an entrance into the loggia with a square window above and another on the first floor. A five-bay colonnade of Ionic semi-columns has tall sashed windows on the ground floor in each bay and square window above at first floor level. The attic storey is behind a pilastered parapet. Originally the reading room was on the ground floor and the library occupied the remainder of the ground floor and a mezzanine gallery. A glass-domed ceiling was inserted at gallery level in about 1920 to separate the new tenants from what remained of the library.<ref name="EH"/>
==Prizes== The Portico Library, in conjunction with its cultural partners and funders, hosts a series of literary prizes throughout the year to celebrate writers and poets from Northern England and beyond. The Portico Prize for Literature was established in 1985 and awarded biennially to a work of fiction or poetry and a work of non-fiction set wholly or mainly in the north of England. The library launched the Sadie Massey Award to celebrate the North West's young writers in 2015.<ref name="prizes" />
===Recipients=== {| class="wikitable" |+ 2010s ! Year ! Winner(s) ! Shortlist ! Ref |- | 2010 | {{Plainlist| * '''Fiction:''' ''How to Paint a Dead Man'', Sarah Hall * '''Non-fiction:''' ''The Plot: A Biography of an English Acre'', Madeleine Bunting }} | | |- | rowspan="2"|2012 | '''Fiction:''' ''The Beautiful Indifference: Stories'', Sarah Hall | {{Flatlist| * ''She's Leaving Home'', Joan Bakewell * ''The Doll Princess'', Tom Benn * ''Ragnarok: The End of the Gods'', A. S. Byatt * ''The Hunger Trace'', Edward Hogan * ''The Last Word'', Mark Illis * ''Reality, Reality'', Jackie Kay * ''The Retribution'', Val McDermid * ''The Testament of Jessie Lamb'', Jane Rogers * ''The Adult'', Joe Stretch * ''Hungry, The Stars and Everything'', Emma Jane Unsworth * ''The Visiting Angel'', Paul Wilson * ''How the Trouble Started'', Robert Williams }} | rowspan="2"|<ref>{{cite web |title=Hall and Sprackland win Portico Prize |url=https://www.thebookseller.com/news/hall-and-sprackland-win-portico-prize|website=The Bookseller|first=Joshua|last=Farrington|date=2012-11-23 |access-date=24 November 2012}}</ref> |- | '''Non-fiction:''' ''Strands: A Year of Discoveries on the Beach'', Jean Sprackland | {{Flatlist| * ''Walking Home'', Simon Armitage * ''William Armstrong, Magician of the North'', Henrietta Heald * ''Nella Last in the 1950s'', Robert and Patricia Malcolmson * ''Jack's Yak'', Keith Richardson * ''Brief Lives: Elizabeth Gaskell'', Alan Shelston * ''The Man Who Couldn't Stop Drawling'', Chris Wadsworth * ''Jews and Other Foreigners'', Bill Williams * ''Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?'', Jeanette Winterson * ''Ralph Tailor's Summer: A Scrivener, his City and the Plague'', Keith Wrightson }} |- | rowspan="2"|2015 | '''Fiction:''' ''Beastings'', Benjamin Myers | {{Flatlist| * ''Boneland'', Alan Garner * ''Her Birth'', Rebecca Goss * ''Terror'', Toby Martinez de las Rivas * ''Two Countries'', Katrina Porteous * ''Drysalter'', Michael Symmons Roberts }} | rowspan="2"|<ref>{{Cite web |last=Cowdrey |first=Katherine |date=30 November 2015 |title=Myers and Benson win £10k Portico Literature Prize |url=https://www.thebookseller.com/news/benjamin-myers-beastings-wins-portico-literature-prize-2015-fiction-317462 |access-date=27 May 2021 |website=The Bookseller |archive-date=27 May 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210527105019/https://www.thebookseller.com/news/benjamin-myers-beastings-wins-portico-literature-prize-2015-fiction-317462 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://poetrysociety.org.uk/news/four-poets-on-the-portico-fiction-shortlist/|title=Porteous, Symmons Roberts, Goss and Martinez de las Rivas on the Portico Fiction shortlist|website=The Poetry Society|date=16 October 2015|access-date=12 September 2024|archive-date=12 September 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240912213657/https://poetrysociety.org.uk/news/four-poets-on-the-portico-fiction-shortlist/|url-status=live}}</ref> |- | '''Non-fiction:''' ''The Valley'', Richard Benson | {{Flatlist| * ''Common Ground'', Rob Cowen * ''A Shepherd's Life'', James Rebanks * ''The Last Act of Love'', Cathy Rentzenbrink * ''The Pinecone'', Jenny Uglow }} |- |}
{| class="wikitable" |+ 2020s ! Year ! Winner(s) ! Shortlist ! Ref |- | 2020 | ''Saltwater'', Jessica Andrews | {{Flatlist| * ''Ironopolis'', Glen James Brown * ''The Boy with the Perpetual Nervousness'', Graham Caveney * ''Under the Rock: The Poetry of a Place'', Benjamin Myers * ''The Mating Habit of Stags'', Ray Robinson * ''Black Teeth and a Brilliant Smile'', Adelle Stripe }} | <ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-51222112|title=Jessica Andrews wins Portico Prize for novel about female 'poetry and power'|work=BBC News|first=Ian|last=Youngs|date=23 January 2020|access-date=28 August 2024|archive-date=28 August 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240828050859/https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-51222112|url-status=live}}</ref> |- | 2022 | ''Toto Among the Murderers'', Sally J Morgan | {{Flatlist| * ''Ghosted'', Jenn Ashworth * ''The Outsiders'', James Corbett * ''The Family Tree'', Sairish Hussain * ''Sea State'', Tabitha Lasley * ''Mayflies'', Andrew O'Hagan }} | <ref>{{Cite news|date=2022-01-21|title=Sally J Morgan wins Portico Prize for novel inspired by a brush with killers|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-60067264|work=BBC News|first=Ian|last=Youngs|access-date=2024-09-10|language=en-GB|archive-date=10 September 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240910234608/https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-60067264|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://publishingperspectives.com/2021/12/the-united-kingdoms-2022-portico-prize-announces-its-shortlist/|title=The United Kingdom's 2022 Portico Prize Announces Its Shortlist|website=Publishing Perspectives|first=Porter|last=Anderson|date=7 December 2021|access-date=10 September 2024|archive-date=23 September 2024|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240923064314/https://publishingperspectives.com/2021/12/the-united-kingdoms-2022-portico-prize-announces-its-shortlist/|url-status=live}}</ref> |- |}
==Notable members== The library's first chairman was John Ferriar and its secretary was Peter Mark Roget. Other notable members include John Dalton, Reverend William Gaskell, Sir Robert Peel and more recently Eric Cantona.<ref name ="History"/> Many of the membership have overlapped with that of the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society.<ref> Complete List of the Members & Officers of the Manchester Literary & Philosophical Society. From its institution on February 28th 1781 to April, 1896.</ref>
==Gallery== <gallery> File:The Portico Library Main Room.jpg|The main room File:The Portico Library Reading Room.jpg|Reading room File:The Portico Library Reading Area.jpg|Reading area </gallery>
==See also== {{Portal|Greater Manchester}} *Grade II* listed buildings in Greater Manchester *List of works by Thomas Harrison *Listed buildings in Manchester-M2 *Listed pubs in Manchester
==References== {{commons category|Portico Library}} {{reflist|40em|refs= <ref name="Hartwell">{{cite book |last=Hartwell |first=Clare |title=Manchester |series=Pevsner Architectural Guides |publisher=Yale University Press |year=2002 |isbn=978-0-300-09666-8 |pages=174–175}}</ref> <ref name="EH">{{NHLE |num=1197930 |desc=The Portico Library and The Bank Public House |access-date=20 April 2012 |mode=cs2}}</ref> <ref name="History">{{cite web |url=http://www.theportico.org.uk/History.html |title=Reflecting the past, inspiring the future |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120415040142/http://www.theportico.org.uk/History.html |archive-date=15 April 2012 |access-date=12 August 2015}}</ref> <ref name="prizes">{{citation |url=http://www.theportico.org.uk/prizes |title=The Portico Prizes |publisher=The Portico Library |access-date=12 August 2015 |archive-date=19 January 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160119151715/http://www.theportico.org.uk/prizes |url-status=dead}}</ref> <ref name="Frangopulo1977">{{cite book |last=Frangopulo |first=Nicholas Joseph |title=Tradition in action: the historical evolution of the Greater Manchester County |year=1977 |publisher=EP Publishing |isbn=0-7158-1203-3 |pages=82}}</ref> }}
{{Manchester B&S|state=collapsed}} {{Authority control}}
Category:Library buildings completed in 1806 Category:Grade II* listed buildings in Manchester Category:Libraries in Manchester Category:Thomas Harrison buildings Category:Greek Revival architecture in the United Kingdom Category:Subscription libraries in England