Listed status for Crewe station after 149 years

Historic England, the government-sponsored organisation charged with protecting the country’s most treasured buildings and structures, has confirmed Grade II-listed status on Crewe’s distinctive cream and orange terracotta brick main station buildings, constructed by the London & North Western Railway almost 150 years ago. The two ‘mirror image’ buildings which face each other on Crewe’s presentday platforms 5 and 6, the ornate screen wall separating platforms 11 and 12, another screen wall on bay Platform 10, and the long retaining wall on the easternmost part of the station site, have all survived numerous station remodelling schemes relatively intact. The design features are attributed to LNWR Chief Civil Engineer for New Works William Baker, and form the core of the ‘new’ Crewe station. Built in 1867, it catered for much-increased traffic, replacing and supplanting an earlier station built by the Grand Junction Railway, to the north of Nantwich Road bridge. Historic England - formerly known as English Heritage - describes the buildings and the screen walls with their ornate bays, arcades and arches as “one of the best pieces of mid-19th century platform architecture designed anywhere on the LNWR network, and adds: “Although altered, the buildings have survived well, taking into account the extreme intensity of use that has taken place.” Among the most decorative aspects of the buildings are a series of bearded faces above the arches of the eastern platform building, known as ‘the Greybeards’, and a granite drinking fountain, installed in 1863 to mark Queen Victoria’s silver jubilee. Beneath it is a castiron trough, which still shows the lettering ‘For ye dogs’.