[3] Its name derives from Hope Street, the road which connects the city's Anglican and Catholic cathedrals, where graduation ceremonies are alternately held.

[5] In 2023, it achieved an overall Silver rating in the UK Government's Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF),[6] and rankings in teaching-focused league tables is comparable with lower-performing Russell Group universities.

[7][8] Former Vice Chancellor Professor Gerald Pillay OBE summarised the university as a liberal arts college-style environment where "[students are] a name, not a number.

[9] Powys, who has a lecture theatre named in his honour in the EDEN Building, was the first Secretary of the Board of Education set up by the Diocese of Chester in 1839.

Designed by the London-based Scottish architects Slater & Moberly[12] at a cost of £170,000 (equivalent to approximately £10m in 2019) in partnership with a young Reginald Uren (who handled the construction phase), it is described by Historic England as being laid out "on a grand scale with accomplished Vernacular Revival styling reminiscent of Lutyens' Home Counties architecture" and "[an] impressive main court [that] maximises views over the Rector's Lawn and is complemented by a cloister-like rear quadrangle".

[14] Christ's had been founded by the Catholic Education Council and upon its creation enrolled like Saint Katharine's and Notre Dame as one of the University of Liverpool's Associated Colleges.

Unlike Notre Dame, it admitted male students and was the first Catholic co-educational teachers' training college in England.

[3] The momentum towards federation was increased in the mid-1970s when the two Victorian colleges (along with similar institutions across the UK) were served with notice of imminent closure by the Government.

[3] Unlike Saint Katharine's and Notre Dame, Christ's was not earmarked for closure given its more modern provenance and also its success at the time.

[3] As the proposed federation promised to bring together Catholic and Anglican education it was supported by Archbishop Worlock and Bishop Sheppard as "a major plank of their wider ecumenical vision for the city".

During the 1980s the two colleges Saint Katharines and CND co-existed under the umbrella of LIHE, with rationalisations gradually taking place to reduce the duplication of functions.

However, whilst on an administrative level this was generally accomplished, at the end of the 1980s and into the 1990s there were still two libraries on the combined LIHE campus, as well as two chapels.

The 1988 Teaching and Higher Education Act had imposed a new accountability framework which made the "tutelage relationship" with the University of Liverpool more inconvenient for LIHE in the early 1990s.

University of Liverpool staff were now required to be present at LIHE subject management meetings and to be consulted over any proposed academic changes, however small.

[19] The name-change represented an attempt to establish a more striking, characterful identity that reflected the original religious purpose of the three founding colleges.

Reflecting upon the renaming in 2003, Elford asserted that "Hope is now arguably one of the most mission-explicit Christian institutions in British higher education".

Upon entering for the first time in 2015 (for the 2016 editions), the university increased its positions, notably in the Guardian league table (which excludes research metrics).

In June 2017 the university was awarded Gold by the UK Government's Office for Students in its Teaching Excellence Framework.

The university also has a residential-only campus, Aigburth Park in St Michael's, and Plas Caerdeon, an outdoor education centre in Snowdonia, North Wales.

[32][33][34] Hope Park is bisected by Taggart Avenue, which runs north–south through the middle of the campus and divides the former sites of two of the university's three predecessor colleges.

In the era when the two colleges existed, high walls ran along both sides of Taggart Avenue, physically separating the institutions.

[37] The university had previously struggled to unite its three predecessor colleges into a single corporate identity, with "internal dissonances" persisting.

[38] Elford argues that, during its time as Liverpool Institute of Higher Education, the university "had effectively failed to establish an identity of its own".

[38] The university adopted red as the main corporate colour of the Hope brand, contrasted primarily with white.

[41] This involved retiring its most recent modern logo, which had been designed in partnership with the London-based creative agency Fabrik in 2006.

[39] (The graphical package produced with Fabrik also included a typeface and general layout and colour-scheme principles for university publications that continued to be used after 2016/17.

[44][45] The university's aim is for 85% of its academic staff to have doctorates and the remainder to be Professional Tutors with industry experience in areas such as education, law and accountancy.

[48] The university's Network of Hope was established in 1998 as a set of partnerships with Catholic sixth-form colleges in the North West.

[1] "Much of my work over the years has explored aspects of feminism, such as the representation of the female body in art history and contemporary visual culture.