My father Eric Leslie, is the carpenter seen left in this photo taken in 1961, stood with back to camera by the crane used for George Longden & Sons' construction of the Co-operative Group’s Castle House department store in Angel Street, Sheffield. Considered sophisticated and Continental in style when the store opened its doors to shoppers in 1962, which were closed for good 47 years later in the spring of 2009.
My father built the spiral staircase around the crane within the pioneering RC structure. The 4-storey structure was a first for such tight-knit steel reinforcing to the concrete, involving a Japanese engineer. This technique had only been applied before to the two-level De Warr Pavilion in Southend. A special vibrator had to be made to distribute the concrete through all the lattice steelwork for the Castle House structure.
It was developed into a building of two parts, designed by G S Hay, (1959-64) & Hadfield Cawkwell & Davidson (1962) incorporating a glass-fibre sculpture of Vulcan by Boris Tietze. A Grade II listing was applied by English Heritage to both parts. Praising the innovative design and interior artwork and fittings, EH concluded it was a significant, high quality piece of post-war commercial architecture.
The spiral staircase's elegance was severely compromised over the years for health & safety following a tragic first year. For the very first Christmas shopping season, the store hosted a Santa's grotto on the top floor, which attracted so many customers that they filled all four levels of the staircase. One child decided to try jumping the queue by scaling the staircase precariously over the side of the balustrade, but when he reached the top tragically fell to a horrific death. The balustrade was subsequently blocked and later the whole stairwell was enclosed. But I remember making the visit to sit on Santa's knee there myself in the company of my dad, who was always proud to show off 'his' staircase.