Central Library

The Central Library, built in 1906 by Crouch, Butler & Savage of Birmingham, is a public library located at Queen's Square in Rawtenstall. It features a red brick structure with a rock-faced sandstone facade and steeply-pitched slate roofs that include ridge ventilators. The building has an L-shaped plan on a corner site, with two wings constructed at a reflex angle, centered around a drum topped with a lantern. The reading hall is segmental and located at the rear.

This two-storey building, with a single-storey reading hall, is designed in a classical style with some baroque details. The entrance is prominently featured at the center of the three-quarter cylindrical corner facade, which includes a one-bay, two-storey ashlar facing. This entrance incorporates a porch supported by free Ionic columns arranged distyle in antis, with a frieze inscribed "PUBLIC LIBRARY" and a dentilled cornice. Above the entrance, there is a sashed window with an architrave and an iron mock-balcony set in a segmental-headed panel, flanked by ornate panelled pilasters, all beneath a prominent dentilled cornice that arches over the center. Each side of the entrance bay has three sashed windows on each floor, all featuring glazing bars, with the upper windows having smaller six-pane upper lights.

The receding wings have round-headed windows at the ground floor and rectangular windows at the first floor. The rear of the building is constructed of red brick, with the reading hall featuring very tall windows, the wings having coupled windows at the first floor, and the drum topped with three tall stairlights. The lantern includes rectangular windows. Inside, the ground floor is a single space with Ionic colonnades, which have foliated bands on the columns and foliated beams in the wings. An Art Nouveau balustrade adorns the staircase within the drum.