The New Market Hall

The New Market Hall

A former market building and assembly rooms, constructed between 1855 and 1859 to designs by Robert Griffiths of Quatford. The building is executed in an Italianate style with arched openings and polychromatic walling of red, white and blue bricks laid in English bond, beneath a hipped slate roof. The structure comprises one and two storeys, with a tower rising to three storeys at its north-east corner.

The original floor plan arranged shops at the eastern end, the market hall to the centre, and the butchers' market at the western end. The building now contains shop premises facing onto Posterngate and Listley Street.

Exterior

The polychromatic decoration is consistent throughout, with banded blue and white bricks forming the lower body of each floor, and blue brick walling extending upwards from the springing level of the arched openings on both floors. The two-storied sections feature a deep cornice with a Lombard frieze of miniature round arches supported on corbels at the top of the first floor walling.

The eastern front to Posterngate comprises a slightly projecting tower at right and seven symmetrical bays to the left, of which the central three bays are closely set. The ground floor arcade is glazed, with a shop front of plate glass windows and fascia imposed over the central three bays in the later 19th or early 20th century. At first floor level, the arched window heads display alternating blue and white voussoirs, with an oculus window above each, surrounded by white brick. The single projecting bay of the tower features banded pilasters to either side, and its second floor displays a trio of round-headed lancets with a large oculus above, possibly intended for a clock face. The tower top swells slightly outward and is pierced by a miniature arcade of five windows beneath the hipped roof, which has deep eaves and a wrought iron weather vane.

The south front has a single projecting bay at right with polychromatic decoration, arched window and oculus matching those described elsewhere. A shop front with fluted pilasters, plate glass window and fascia has been imposed at ground floor level. To the left stand the frontages of two late 18th or early 19th century houses, against whose back wall the market hall was built; these do not form part of this item.

The north front includes the tower at left, followed by six bays of two storeys arranged as on Posterngate. To the right extends the seven-bay frontage of the market hall. The first floor is recessed, with bays on both floors divided by banded pilasters of blue and white set against blue brick walling and a white brick plinth. A deep band of red and white brickwork with zig-zag patterning crowns the first floor walling. The market hall doorway lies in the fifth bay from the left. Two windows to the right have had their sills lowered, and at the far right, set in a wide pilaster buttress at the corner, is an arched doorway to the former porters' room. The shallow-pitched roofing above this ground floor section is glazed to admit light to the market stalls.

To the far right of the north front stands the single-storey range of the former butchers' market. This comprises five bays with walling of banded white and blue bricks and a central wide basket-arched doorway flanked by deep windows with round-arched heads and plate glass windows, replaced in the 20th century.

Interior

The original entrance hall, accessed from Posterngate, has been altered by relocation of its southern wall further north, though the smaller resulting room retains its original patterned tile floor. An imperial staircase with stone treads and cast-iron balustrade rises to the first floor. The market hall remains subdivided but retains cast-iron brackets and slender pillars supporting the timber beams beneath the first floor.

The former town hall chamber or assembly room above the market hall features square-headed windows to each side, with moulded surrounds and aprons forming part of the dado panelling, including a large incised oval beneath each window. The west end contains a shallow arched recess at the wall centre, with doorways at either side featuring moulded surrounds including frieze and cornice, and a patera above each. The eastern end has a pair of original panelled doors at wall centre with a moulded surround. The deeply coved and panelled 19th-century ceiling is partially obscured by a suspended 20th-century ceiling.