Description

TR 2235 NW FOLKESTONE THE LEAS
(South side)
737/5/10009
Leas Cliff Hall

II

Seaside pavilion with concert/dance hall. Designed in 1913 by J L Seaton Dahl but built between 1925 and 1927 with some 1980 refurbishment and alterations. Neo-Grec style building built directly into the cliff face. Concrete pier construction with ferro-concrete main floor and steel columns and girders filled in with brick where necessary. Two lower floors are finished in sand-faced stucco and colourwashed, the two upper floors clad in faience. Three balconies, the lower one cantilevered, with metal balustrading. Flat roof with terrace and 1980 octagonal pagoda style entrance, replacing original neo-Grec entrance. Four storeys; 15 bays to three lower floors and 10 bays to top floor, metal-framed windows, some original, others of similar design, with much of the glass replaced by bronze tinted glass c.1980. Third floor is recessed and projects a few feet above the level of The Leas with ornate metal balustrading with piers at regular intervals on three sides and steps down to balcony above second floor. Elaborate cornice with modillions, brackets and lions' head masks. Triple windows with circular motifs above. Central semi-circular dome. Second floor has wide cantilevered concrete balcony with metal balustrading and central 13 window bays, including central 3-light curved bay, have half-columns, end bays have paired columns and sides have pilasters and pedimented entrances with panels bearing the emblem of Folkestone crowned by acroterion and flanked by dolphins, pilasters, cornice and double doors. Cornice is decorated with wreaths. First floor has windows in two tiers with central three windows to round-headed bay having small cantilevered balcony with metal balustrading. Ground floor is set back with a colonnade of square piers.
INTERIOR: Grand staircase of terrazzo with Carborundum inlay to the treads (since carpeted) and metal balustrading and main hall 122 feet by 67 feet and 28 feet high with coffered ceiling, Composite columns, semi-circular recess for orchestra and balconies with metal balustrading. There was also a smaller reading room.

[BOE North East and East Kent p328.
J M Paine and K S Paine "The History of the Leas Cliff Hall and Leas Shelter, Folkestone", pamphlet produced for Folkestone and District Local History Society. ]

Listing NGR: TR2240235510

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Leas Cliff Hall at Wikipedia
• Leas Cliff Hall official website
• Wikidata Q6510259

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

• 
  The Listed Buildings and Other Principal Structures at the Royal Gunpowder Mills Waltham Abbey
• 
  Bedfordshire, Huntingdonshire, and Peterborough (Pevsner Architectural Guides) (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  [(Cumberland and Westmorland)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1967)
• 
  Department for Communities Listed Historic Buildings of Northern Ireland: Information Guide for the 2nd Survey of Historic Buildings
• 
  Devon (Pevsner Buildings of England)
• 
  Hampshire: South (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)