page_title: Leek, Staffordshire
section_title: Sugden buildings
hierarchical_section_title: Leek, Staffordshire / Architecture and development / Sugden buildings
caption_attribution_description: English: Leek, Staffordshire, England.
context_page_description: Leek is a market town and civil parish in the county of Staffordshire, England, on the River Churnet. It is situated about 10 miles north east of Stoke-on-Trent. It is an ancient borough and was granted its royal charter in 1214.
  It is the administrative centre for the Staffordshire Moorlands District Council. King John granted Ranulph de Blondeville, 6th Earl of Chester, the right to hold a weekly Wednesday market and an annual seven-day fair in Leek in 1207.
  Leek's coat of arms is made up of a Saltire Shield. On the top is the Stafford Knot, either side is the Leek "Double Sunset" and below a gold garb. The crest is a mural crown with three Mulberry leaves on a Mount of Heather on top of which a Moorcock is resting his claw on a small-weave Shuttle. The motto 'ARTE FAVENTE NIL DESPERANDUM' translates to: Our skill assisting us, we have no cause for despair.
context_section_description: Many of Leek's buildings were built by the family architectural practice of the Sugdens. In 1849 William Sugden (b. 1821 in Keighley) came to Leek. He was an architect and his work on the design of the railway stations for the Churnet Valley Railway brought him to the area. In the following year William’s son, Larner Sugden, was born. After schooling in Yorkshire, Larner returned to Leek in 1866 to be apprenticed to his father as an architect, and thus was formed the famous Sugden & Son (Architects), whose influence on the town was to be profound. The firm had offices in Derby Street. The building still survives, the ground floor now being occupied by Boots the Chemist. Larner was a great supporter of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings, and so Leek’s development was in sympathetic hands.
  The architectural output from Sugden & Son was both prolific and varied. Some of the buildings designed by the Sugdens are as follows:
  the Congregational Church with its 130’ spire, (now Trinity Church), built in the Victorian Gothic Revival style (1863)
  Myatt’s Mill in Earl Street (1864)
  Mill Street Methodist Chapel and Ragged School (1870),
  the Cottage Hospital, in memory of silk manufacturer James Allsop (1871),
  their own houses in Queen Street, complete with monograms for William, Larner and for Larner’s French wife (1877),
  West Street School (extended in 1881),
  the District Bank, which exhibits a strong Richard Norman Shaw influence (1882)
  the Leonard Street Police Station in Scottish Baronial style (1891). This last was probably the last joint venture of the father-and-son team because William Sugden died in 1892.
  The Sugden masterpiece was, perhaps, the Nicholson Institute, built in the Queen Anne style, in 1882. The fact that this building is tucked away behind the 17th century ‘Greystones’ is a further indication of Larner’s regard for old buildings. Larner would not countenance demolition of the old building, and so, as the Nicholsons owned the land to the rear, that is where the Institute was built. Larner cleverly incorporated the busts of Shakespeare, Newton, Reynolds and Tennyson into the building representing 400 years of artistic and scientific achievement from the 16th to the 19th century and embracing literature, science, art and poetry.
  In 1899 came the Technical Schools and the Co-operative Society Hall. Although the original town centre cattle market was demolished and replaced with a bus station and shopping centre in the 1960s, the new cattle market was built on the edge of town adjacent to the railway station. Later, this was one of the stations closed following Dr. Beeching's recommendations, and a supermarket (Morrisons) now stands on the site.
  The Nicholson War Memorial was dedicated in 1925.
  Leek offers some contemporary architecture, most notably the alterations and refurbishment to Trinity Church on Derby Street (2011) and new teaching building on Horton Street for Leek College (2013).
caption: Market Place, Leek
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