Facilities

The Centre for Urban History is relocating to the Attenborough Tower on the main University campus. Please check back for updates.

Library/reading room

The Centre has its own growing specialist library to compliment the University Library's excellent collection of urban, archaeological and local history books and journals. The Centre also enjoys a close relationship with local record offices, which have major urban archives dating back to the middle ages. The Centre for Urban History shares space with the Centre for Regional and Local History, and our collections include the Marc Fitch Local History Collection and the Dyos Collection of works on urban history. Several thousand specialist volumes are available on a reference basis in the reading room and regular additions are made to ensure the collections are up to date. Recent additions include the Simon Littlewood collection, which includes material on advertising, engineering and architectural history. There is an electronic catalogue covering the urban history collection.

The Library is currently being relocated to the new space in the Attenborough Tower and the collection is currently unavailable. Plase check back for updates. 

Map room

An extensive collection of British maps at various scales is available and there are gazetteers, directories, lists of place name and similar reference works concerned with the physical features and built form of British towns and cities. There are a number of antiquarian maps too.

Topography library

This collection, also part of that left by Marc Fitch, includes general works on themes – transport, architecture, buildings, land and so on – as well as specialist works classified by county. This is an extensive specialist collection useful to those whose research interests can be identified with a particular area or region of the UK.