Abstract

Although not accomplished as conceived, Lee House, Great Bridgewater Street, is a significant project in the history of the Manchester commercial textile warehouse. As one of the last examples to be designed for the city centre, it is innovative and deviates from the pattern that had evolved from the 1830s. This was due to two factors: the precedent of the American skyscraper, which had evolved since 1870, and, most influential, the involvement of two architects, Harry S. Fairhurst and J. Henry Sellers, and their different fields of expression.