As 140 members of Swindon Borough Council’s children’s services department move out to Wat Tyler House, Sanford Street School building stands boarded up and vulnerable. It was quite a different story when the school opened in 1881. On January 8, 1880 Ipswich based architect Brightwen Binyon presented his plans to the Swindon School Board for approval. The cost of building a school to accommodate 800 children on the corner of Sanford Street and College Street was estimated at £4,000. In the same year Brightwen Binyon also designed Queenstown School and Gilbert’s Hill Girls and Infants School. Westcott School in Birch Street followed in 1881 and in 1891-3 he designed extensions to the Mechanics Institution, another Swindon building in dire need of rescue. Gloucester builder D.C. Jones & Co won the contract for Sanford Street School but by August 1880 they were in trouble. Work was not progressing as speedily as the hard pressed School Board required....