The English Railway Station is subject of a lecture this week by railway architecture expert at Banbury Historical Society - watch at home

Prof Parissien writes that as early as 1850, the Irish scientist Dr Dionysus Lardner had written in his Railway Economy that ‘It is impossible to regard the vast buildings and their dependencies… without feelings of inexpressible astonishment at the magnitude of the capital and boldness of the enterprise’.

A century later Lardner was echoed by railway historian Gordon Biddle, who pronounced that ‘the tremendous variety of station styles formed a microcosm of nineteenth-century building’. This lecture looks at the variety, the ambition, the exuberance and the fate of this most distinctive of building types.

Steven Parissien is a highly entertaining lecturer and is a Fellow of Kellogg College, Oxford, and Director of Weekly Classes and of Study Skills at Oxford University’s Department for Continuing Education. He is a cultural historian who has written 12 books to date and has made a particular study of railway station architecture.

Lectures take place in the Education Room of Banbury Museum. There will be a small, distanced but actual live audience there, but it will also be possible for people to watch this at home. Either way, please sign in with Simon Townsend ([email protected]).

The museum needs to ensure it does not have too many attenders in person, and Mr Townsend needs to know to whom he will be sending the link for those watching at home.

Non-members are very welcome either way: they can receive one lecture free but will then be invited to pay per screening, or to join the society.