Visitors to Everton Football Club’s new stadium at Bramley Moore Dock in Liverpool may be impressed by the modern design, alongside some traditional design touches, but observant visitors will also notice the Victorian brick tower on the site that has been painstakingly restored.
A BBC report on the first event at the venue – an under-19s match attended by 10,000 fans – noted that the transformation of the old dock into a modern stadium included significant remediation work on surrounding structures, including the Grade II listed hydraulic tower and dockside railroad tracks.
The hydraulic tower and engine house was built in 1883 and the restoration included brick cleaning and salvage work, ensuring that it now looks pristine and constitutes an iconic element of the site, reminding visitors of the historic dockland heritage of the area, albeit one that has controversially lost its UNESCO World Heritage status.
Emily Watson, a site manager at Laing O’Rourke, told Building, Design and Construction Magazine: “We’ve have had to undertake a lot of remedial repairs and original make-safe works to get the building into a safe spot.”
She noted that the project required extensive collaboration with the city council and heritage consultants to ensure the restoration met the listing requirements, commenting: “There was another Listed Building condition that meant we had to get sign off on the brickwork, so it could match the original design as much as possible.”
The restoration project has taken around two years, running simultaneously with the scheme to build the new stadium, which will house 52,888 spectators.
It will replace the ageing Goodison Park, which has been Everton’s home ground since 1892 and will now be demolished and replaced with new housing.
The club had originally played at nearby Anfield, but moved after a rent dispute with the landlord and later mayor of Liverpool John Houlding. Houlding then formed Liverpool Football Club to play at the venue.