What type of university is the University of Liverpool?

A 'red brick' university (or redbrick university) was originally one of the nine civic universities founded in the major industrial cities of England in the 19th century.

The origins of the term 'red brick' university go back to the Victorian era when a number of specialist institutions gained independence and became fully-fledged universities in their own right. These universities got their 'red brick' label from the style of brickwork common at that time.

The term 'red brick' or 'redbrick' was coined by Edgar Allison Peers, a professor of Spanish at the University of Liverpool, to describe the civic universities in his 1943 book Redbrick University. While the University of Liverpool was an inspiration for the 'red brick' university alluded to in Peers' book, receiving university status in 1903, the University of Birmingham was the first of the civic universities to gain independent university status in 1900 and the University has stated that the popularity of the term 'red brick' owes much to its own Chancellor's Court, constructed from Accrington red brick.