Rochdale museum shortlisted for architecture prize

Rochdale Pioneers Museum

Rochdale Pioneers Museum, which reopened last October after a two-year £2.3m facelift, is nominated for the Architects Journal Retrofit Award. The award celebrates projects which have extended the life of an existing building in an innovative way. 

Celebrated around the world as the birthplace of the co-operative movement, the first Co-operative Society shop was opened here by the Rochdale Equitable Pioneers Society in 1844.

Manchester architects Loop Systems were brought in by the museum to maximise space and to improve accessibility and energy efficiency of the Grade II listed building, which is situated in the Toad Lane Conservation Area.

A £1.5m Heritage Lottery Fund grant allowed much of the building’s former glory to be reinstated, after emergency repairs were carried out in the 1970s to save the building from collapse.

Alongside sympathetic restoration works – including traditional lime pointing and replacement of stone slates - Loop Systems designed a stand out ellipse-shaped tower to house a new staircase and lift.

Neil Allen from Loop Systems said: “We specialise in ‘the messy stuff’. We love to work creatively with existing buildings to refurbish, extend and address energy efficiency.

“There’s been a real change of attitude over the last few years in Greater Manchester. People are at last recognising the richness to be found in older buildings and are keener to adopt a make-do-and-mend attitude towards them.

“With retrofit, you can have your cake and eat it. The ethos is about taking the best of the old and bringing it up to date with new aesthetics, technologies and energy efficiency. Old and new can sit together very well, as the shortlisted projects in these awards prove.”

Rachael Vorberg-Rugh, consultant to the Rochdale Pioneers Museum, said: “It is truly a joy to see the museum today, open to the public and helping a new generation of visitors explore the co-operative movement.

“That it can do so in a building that retains its past, serves the present, and looks to the future is a testament to the hard work and vision of its architects”.

The winner will be announced at a gala dinner in London on 11 September.