Town Hall Arts Centre

The Town Hall Arts Centre, originally built as a public hall in 1883 by Edward Sharman of Wellingborough, was donated by the Gurteen family. It is constructed of red brick with stone and glazed tile dressings, topped with a slate roof. The building is two stories plus an attic and features a three-bay gabled front facing the street, with a prominent full-height central porch. The porch has arched openings on three sides at the ground floor, while the first floor showcases an oriel window adorned with cast-iron decorative latticing in the upper lights. At the attic level, there is a geometric traceried three-light window. Each side of the porch has paired lancets on both the ground and first floors, with the first-floor windows featuring a common shouldered hood. Decorative cast-iron latticing is repeated throughout. The first floor includes a band of glazed tiles, while the second floor is finished with cement rendering. The building has corbelled and dentilled eaves cornice and a hipped roof with apex gablets that are pierced by octofoil roundels. The returns of the building have seven-window ranges with two-light casements on both floors. Inside, to the right of the porch, there is a closed-string staircase with turned balusters and a panelled string. The entire first floor is occupied by the Council Chamber, which is fitted with dado panelling and features a barrel roof on arched braces that describes a semicircular profile, supported by four tiers of purlins.