The North Wall is owned and managed by St Edward's School, an independent, co-educational boarding school which was founded in 1863 in the centre of Oxford, and moved to its present site in Summertown in 1873. A vigorous 15-year building programme then followed, during which all the Victorian buildings which you see today were completed. The last of these was an indoor swimming pool, which was completed in 1888.

After over a century of use, this pool became redundant when a new one was built on the school playing fields, and after it had served as a storeroom for a few years, the School Governors decided to develop the pool and adjoining buildings as a new arts centre. This decision was driven by David Christie (the Warden), the composer George Fenton (a Governor and former pupil of the School), and Anthony Kerr-Dineen, St Edward's Director of Cultural Activities. The London architects, Haworth Tompkins, were commissioned to design a building which would blend a Victorian listed building with modern architecture, and which would provide a theatre, drama and dance studios, and an art gallery.