Birmingham University

The designer of the Entrance Court and Clock Tower at Birmingham was the Edwardian Architect Aston Webb, who at the time had the largest Architectural practice in the country. His buildings include the V&A, Christ's Hospital and the Royal Naval College at Dartmouth. He is best known for his work in recreating the Mall into a more appropriate Imperial Style by refacing Buckingham Palace in Portland Stone and designing Admiralty Arch.

The curved series of linked square pavilions that make up the original buildings of Birmingham University have rather more of an oriental than an English feel to them, though the use of red brick banded with a buff coloured sandstone to some degree compensates for this. The corner turrets of the pavilions are tapered, following the idea of the entasis of a classical column, and the areas of blank brickwork are decorated by mosaic panels on the theme of work and industry by the Arts and Craft artist Robert Anning Bell. The Tower is simply enormous and was presumably originally intended to be visible from the City.