Town Hall, Ancillary Buildings And Former Police Station To Rear

1. WEST STREET 5099 (east side)

NZ 2563 5/118 Town Hall, ancillary buildings and former II Police Station to rear

1. 1868-70 by John Johnstone. Ashlar, Welsh slate roof. Substantial composition in neo-Romanesque style with errant details. Two storeys, two, three and two bays. Central block taller and projecting, with bays framed in pilasters supporting heavy entablature with ornamental frieze and modillion cornice. Balustraded balcony over has corner pedestals with urns (some missing) central segmental pediment with allegorical figures and plinth with larger figure above. Side sections have lower, hip ended roofs and simpler entablatures also resting on pilasters. Paired round arched first floor windows, those in centre in round arched recesses with oculi in heads. Ground floor paired segmental headed windows, banded pilasters and rusticated plinth.

Round-arched central entrance with nook shafts and mouldings. Set back outer entrance bays have similar doorways, the northern one up a lone flight of steps as the hill slopes down.

North return has four bays of this building in similar style but with a full basement storey. Then a mid C19 Italianate ashlar building of two storeys, six bays, the left bay being a four-storey square tower with a second-floor corbel table and deeply overhanging eaves, a pyramidal roof and eccentrically placed stone chimneys.

Beyond this a later two-storey, three-window ashlar building of simple character. South return shows long rear part of rubble with round first floor windows in raised surrounds. This seems to be a much earlier building, possibly late C18, which was adapted and incorporated into the Town Hall complex.

Listing NGR: NZ2547063377