1 The Avenue 1 The Avenue 1 The Avenue is a building in Spinningfields, Manchester. It is situated on Deansgate adjacent to the grade-I listed John Rylands Library. The building consists of two mirror-image parallelograms, stacked one on top of the other, resulting in a three-storey cantilever on the east end of the building. The cantilever is supported by an inclined steel ‘diagrid’ structure. Reaction to the glass clad building has been mixed due its proximity to the Grade I listed Rylands Library which, along with the Town Hall is considered the finest piece of architecture in Manchester and one of the finest
John Rylands other benefactions he established and maintained orphanages, homes for aged gentlewomen, a home of rest for ministers of slender means, and he provided a town hall, public baths, library and a coffeehouse in the town of Stretford, where he lived. He also built an institute for the benefit of the villagers of Havenstreet on the Isle of Wight, where Rylands passed some of his later years from 1882, having built a house named Longford there after his mainland estate. His donations to the poor of Rome were so generous as to induce the king to decorate him in 1880 with