Toast Rack (building)

Hollings Building
250px The Toast Rack and Fried Egg
Alternative names	The Toast Rack
General information
Status	Grade II
Type	Academic
Architectural style	Brutalist
Location	Fallowfield, Manchester
Coordinates
Construction started	1957
Opened	1960
Renovated	1994
Owner	Estrela Properties Ltd
Design and construction
Architect	LC Howitt

The Toast Rack, or the Hollings Building by its official name, is a Modernist building in Manchester, England. The building was completed in 1960 as the Domestic Trades College, became part of Manchester Polytechnic then Manchester Metropolitan University until closure of the "Hollings Campus" in 2013. It was designed by the city architect, Leonard Cecil Howitt and is known as the Toast Rack due to its distinctive form (reflecting its use as a catering college).

The pre-eminent architecture critic Nikolaus Pevsner described the building as "a perfect piece of pop architecture". It was Grade II listed in April 1998 by English Heritage who describe the structure as, "a distinctive and memorable building which demonstrates this architect's love of structural gymnastics in a dramatic way". To others the building symbolises the ideals of the Festival of Britain and architectural positivity following World War II.

The building's structure consists of a concrete frame with a brick infill on the bottom half of each storey. The building is seven storeys high and its hyperbolic paraboloid frame continues on the exterior, hence the toast rack comparison. Although the building's unorthodox form is playful, its tapering shape also helps to divide space into varying sizes for larger and smaller classes. A semi-circular restaurant block is attached to the west and is informally known as the Fried Egg

Manchester Metropolitan University left their Hollings Campus in 2013 as the consolidated their facilities towards the city centre. The Toast Rack is now up for sale and it is hoped it will be renovated.