Description

LANCASTER

SD4761NE DALTON SQUARE
1685-1/7/110 (South side)
22/12/53 Town Hall

GV II*

Town hall. 1906-9. By Edward Mountford, with exterior stone
carving by Gilbert Seale and woodwork by Waring and Gillow.
Sandstone ashlar, with steel, brick, and clinker ash concrete
used structurally. Slate roofs. Large rectangular plan, with
the principal front facing north towards Dalton Square, the
west elevation to Thurnham Street, and the south elevation,
with the entrance to the Ashton Hall, facing George Street.
Edwardian Baroque style. 2 and 3 storeys, above a basement.
The windows are glazing bar sashes.
The entrance front is of 11 bays with a hexastyle portico of
giant unfluted Ionic columns raised on sandstone steps. The
tympanum of the pediment is filled by limestone figurative
sculpture: in the centre is seated King Edward VII with
sceptre and orb. The ground-floor masonry is rusticated and
the round-arched doorway is flanked by round-headed niches.
Above the balustraded parapet the clock tower is visible,
rising behind the roof of the front range. Above the cornice
of its lowest stage are aedicules facing each cardinal
direction, with Tuscan columns. Across each corner angle is a
short entablature supported by paired columns. Above the clock
stage is a ribbed stone dome with a central finial. The long
east and west facades are articulated by centrepieces treated
as porticoes of engaged columns and triangular pediments, and
by segmental pediments towards their outer ends. The south
facade has at its centre 3 round-arched doorways to the Ashton
Hall. Above are 2 pairs of Tuscan columns in antis, the lower
part of the recess being filled between the columns by
stonework pierced by round window openings.
INTERIOR: the entrance hall contains a marble staircase rising
to the principal rooms on the first floor. Spanish red marble
is used in the lining of the main corridors on the ground
floor, which contains, near the centre of the building, the
former Magistrates' Courtroom. This has timber-panelled walls,
a magistrates' bench, a dock with direct access to cells
below, and has a saucer dome and top lighting. Across the
front of the building at first-floor level is a suite of
inter-connecting rooms divided by vertically-sliding timber
screens: the Banqueting Chamber, Reception Room, and Mayor's
Parlour. The walls are lined with panelling of Austrian oak
and ceiled with segmental stucco tunnel vaults.
The Mayor's Parlour contains a bolection-moulded marble
fireplace, and an overmantel with a portrait of Lady Ashton.
Swedish green marble is used to line the principal corridors
on the first floor. The Council Chamber is lined with timber
panelling, with engaged Corinthian columns, and has apsidal
ends, a glazed saucer dome, and benches forming an oval. The
Ashton Hall has a segmental vaulted ceiling, and galleries on
3 sides. At the west end is the stage, with an organ in an oak
case carved with the Arms of Lancaster, raised on 4 pairs of
unfluted Doric columns.

Listing NGR: SD4786561552

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Lancaster Town Hall at Wikipedia
• Wikidata Q17531493

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  London 3: North West: North West v. 3 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990
• 
  Hampshire: South (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Kent: West and the Weald: The Buildings of England (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Gwent/Monmouthshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of Wales)
• 
  Historic Environment Law: Planning, Listed Buildings, Monuments, Conservation Areas and Objects by Harwood, Richard (2012) Paperback