Philharmonic Hall on Hope Street in Liverpool is one of England’s most historically significant concert venues, carrying a Grade II* listing on the National Heritage List for England. It has been the home of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Society since the organisation’s early years, though the building visitors see today is not the original – a fire in 1933 destroyed its predecessor, and the present hall opened in 1939.
The Original Hall
The Liverpool Philharmonic Society was founded in 1840 but went without a permanent home for several years. In 1844, Liverpool architect John Cunningham was appointed to draw up plans, initially for a concert room to hold 1,500 people at a cost of at least £4,000. The brief was soon expanded to a full concert hall with capacity for 2,100 audience members and an orchestra of 250, along with refreshment and retiring rooms. Subscribers could buy shares or purchase seats along the hall’s sides. The foundation stone was laid in 1846, and there were plans for Mendelssohn to write a cantata for the opening ceremony – plans that came to nothing when he died before completing the work.
Opening and Interior
The hall cost £30,000 – equivalent to around £3.3 million today – and opened on 27 August 1849 with a week-long festival. A correspondent for The Times wrote that it was “one of the finest and best adapted to music that I ever entered”. The interior was elaborate: 65 boxes arranged along the sides beneath galleries supported by gilded pillars, gas-burners running along the upper level, and an orchestra recess at the east end framed by a large arch. Bronze music stands topped with lyres filled the semicircular platform, backed by a classical organ. The body of the hall measured roughly 104 feet in length without the orchestra space, extending to around 150 feet with it, and stretched nearly 100 feet across. Stalls across the floor were fitted with armchairs, and ventilated windows with perforated zinc panels lined the walls.
Fire and Rebuilding
That original structure survived for less than a century. Fire destroyed it in 1933, and a replacement was constructed on the same Hope Street site, opening in 1939. It is this building that holds the Grade II* listed status and continues to house the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Society today.