The Law Courts

WOLVERHAMPTON

SO9198NW NORTH STREET 895-1/11/276 (West side) 16/07/49 The Law Courts (Formerly Listed as: NORTH STREET, Wolverhampton (West side) Town Hall)

GV II

Shown on O.S. map as Town Hall. Town Hall, now Crown Courts. 1867-71. By E.Bates. Ashlar with brick returns, slate roofs. 2 storeys with attic; 15 bays, centre bay and 2 bays at each end project. French Renaissance style. Rock-faced plinth, band over ground floor, giant angle pilasters and top entablature with balustraded parapet; centre bay has paired pilasters. Ground floor has segmental-headed windows with keystones and sashes; 1st floor has round-headed casement windows in recesses with flat pilasters, archivolts and keystones, that to centre is Venetian window with enriched spandrels and large keystone, bracketed balcony has panel with town arms; frieze above is panelled. Segmental-headed central entrance has architrave, keystone and lamp bracket with later lamp, paired panelled doors. Central bay has clock to parapet with segmental pediment and 6 flanking urns, domical vault with iron cresting and 2 enriched bulls' eyes; flanking stacks with cornices; end bays have round-headed dormer windows with segmental pediments and flanking urns, pavilion roofs have iron cresting and flanking stacks. Returns have similar treatment to 1st 2 bays with blind windows, the rest of brick with windows in round-headed recesses over basement due to slope of ground, 3 bays to right return have large windows to former council chamber. INTERIOR: octagonal entrance hall has piers with Corinthian capitals, coved ceiling and lantern with moulded surround; elliptical arch to entrance has coffered soffit, wood balustraded balcony above; entrances to left and right have panelled pilaster strips and friezes under consoled segmental pediments and paired panelled doors; staircase leads off hall to rear, square balusters to swept-out handrails, statue of G.B.Thorneycroft, the 1st mayor, 1851, taken from his grave in Wolverhampton Cemetery in 1874; other faces have niches with coffered vaulting; floor has central panel of encaustic tiles; No 2 court, formerly council chamber, has panelled walls and fittings and coved canopy with central domical vault to dais; stained glass to windows; Ionic columns to balcony. Panelled Mayor's Parlour with ribbed ceiling, open pedimented doorway and Ionic pilasters to overmantle of fireplace. (West KJ: Merridale Heritage Trail: Wolverhampton: P.10).

Listing NGR: SO9126198714