Former Temperance Billiard Hall

This List entry was subject to a Minor Amendment on 17/01/2018

SJ 89 SW, 698-1/8/10042

MANCHESTER ROAD, Chorlton No. 21A, Former Temperance Billiard Hall

(Formerly Listed as: Chorlton Snooker Centre)

II

Former Temperance Billiard Hall, snooker centre when surveyed, c. 1907, with minor late-C20 alterations. By Norman Evans, company architect for the Temperance Billiard Hall Company of Pendleton. Red brick and terracotta, with a lead sheet covered roof Rectangular-plan, open sports hall beneath barrel-vaulted roof carried on curved composite timber roof trusses. FRONT: Stilted semicircular front wall, with wide Venetian window above advanced single-storey entrance bay to street frontage. This is comprised of a domed entrance pavilion to the left, with semicircular-headed door and window openings; a central, 9-light, shallow-curved bow window, the lower parts covered over but retaining original window frames and glass; to the right, a set-back secondary entrance with double doors beneath a projecting curved canopy with dentilled cill and three semicircular headed lights with stained glass panels. Oeil de boeuf window to wall to the left of the secondary entrance. All elements of the elevation are linked by a bold, bracketed eaves cornice. The decorative glass to the front elevation is in the Art Nouveau style. SIDE to right with three 5-light dormer windows beneath eared, shallow-arched heads. The roofs of the windows penetrate the curved, lead-sheeted roof. Truncated ventilator cupola to ridge towards the rear of the roof. INTERIOR: undivided hall, with metal tie rods at wall-plate level linking feet of roof trusses. Original seating benches set between truss feet, with surviving original canopies mostly concealed. Ornate cast-iron spiral stair to basement services. Some moulded plasterwork to interior of entrance pavilion.

HISTORY: The Temperance Billiard Hall Company built a number of halls in the Greater Manchester and South London areas. The company was founded by H. Neville Barley, whose intention was to remove the game from the public house, and the Chorlton billiard hall is of special interest as a purpose-built facility to further the objectives of the Temperance movement. Norman Evans was the company architect from 1906 to 1910, and the Chorlton hall is considered to be the most complete of his designs to survive in the Greater Manchester area.

Listing NGR: SJ8157094203