A Story of Reinvention and Civic Pride
Old Fire Station | UH Team
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Salford Central Fire Station, 1969 (Facebook Group – We Grew Up in Salford)
Salford’s civic landscape tells a story of reinvention. Nowhere is this clearer than with the paired histories of the Old Fire Station and the former Salford Central Police Headquarters.
The red-brick fire station was built in 1903 for the County Borough of Salford. Designed with arched engine bays and upper-floor accommodation, it originally housed horse-drawn fire engines before adapting to motorised appliances in the early twentieth century. For decades, it served this industrial town where mills, warehouses and tightly packed housing made fire protection essential.
Following the reorganisation of local authorities, newer purpose-built stations gradually replaced older municipal buildings. The station was decommissioned in 1986 and stood empty for many years.
Salford Central Fire Station, 1969 (Manchester History)
Directly opposite, the former Salford Central Police Headquarters opened in 1957 as part of the city’s post-war reconstruction. The imposing building formed a civic counterpart to the fire station. Behind its formal façade lay blast walls, holding cells and utilitarian interiors that reflected mid-twentieth-century ideas of security and authority. Decommissioned in 2008, it narrowly avoided demolition in 2017 when the architectural significance of its façade was recognised. Since then, several proposals have attempted to bring the structure back into use, and it has become a site of interest for urban explorers documenting its peeling paint, exposed concrete and slow decay.
Inside the Abandoned Station (Facebook – The Tourist Historian)
The Old Fire Station, however, found a more secure future. Recognising its historical and architectural value, the University of Salford undertook its restoration and adaptation. The main building now houses the University’s Council Chamber and three boardrooms, carefully redesigned to preserve original features. In a deliberate nod to the building’s former purpose, the fireman’s poles were retained!
The former engine bays have been transformed into a bar, brewery, café and bakery. The scale and openness of the original design have proved well suited to hospitality use, demonstrating how historic civic buildings can be adapted without losing their character.
The University has also embedded The Old Fire Station and its Lark Hill Brewery within a wide range of academic programmes. From accounting and biochemistry to photography and sustainability, students gain practical experience in a live commercial environment.
This revival builds on Salford’s longer traditions of industry and education. Just a short distance from Lark Hill Brewery, James Prescott Joule – physicist, mathematician and brewer – conducted his nineteenth-century work. Meanwhile the construction of Salford Technical College was famously funded with the ambition of “distilling wisdom out of whisky, genius out of gin, and capacity for business out of beer.” Baking, too, was taught at the Royal Technical College Salford until the 1960s.
Together, these buildings chart Salford’s evolution with a focus on heritage, education and creative reuse. Watch out for a new installation at the old Police Station as part of the Salford 100 celebrations!
PHOTO CREDIT: We Grew Up in Salford, ManchesterHistory.Net, The Tourist Historian
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