Hampstead Town Hall And Attached Walls And Piers

CAMDEN

TQ2785SW HAVERSTOCK HILL 798-1/39/789 (South West side) 01/08/94 Hampstead Town Hall and attached walls & piers

II

Town hall, now council offices. 1877-8. By HE Kendall and Frederick Mew. Red brick, rusticated at ground floor level, with stone dressings. Italianate style. EXTERIOR: symmetrical design. Central stone-cased entrance with panelled pilasters supporting mask console brackets to pediment with carved, foliated cartouche and acroterion; double part-glazed panelled doors, with 2 rectangular overlights and a further overlight, approached by wide steps with low stone balustrades having elaborately enriched cast-iron lampstandards with ladder bars and Windsor lanterns. To each side of the entrance, 3 stone architraved sashes with scrolled pediments incorporating architraved oculi. Dentil cornice at 1st floor level below a blind balustrade with panels of carved enrichment. 3 tall round-arched central windows flanked by brick pilasters linked by impost bands; pilasters marking bays and angles continue in fluted stone to support an entablature with "Town Hall" inscribed on the frieze and modillion cornice crowned by a pediment with oculus above central bay and parapet above outer bays. Returns without entrances but in similar style and having friezes inscribed "Erected AD 1877". INTERIOR: with many original details including cornices, fireplaces, clocks and radiators. Top-lit entrance hall with patterned tile floor and Imperial stair with elaborate cast-iron balusters and newels having brass lamp-holders. At 1st landing, a round-arched mirror in marble surround with clock in pediment. In right hand stair well, a marble 1st World War Memorial with columns supporting an entablature surmounted by a coat of arms. Good marble fireplace in porter's booth. In rear corridor a Boer War memorial formed of brass panels. First-floor assembly hall with stage has heavy cornice with console brackets dropping down over frieze. Secondary stair with cast-iron balustrade. Included as a fine early example of a London vestry hall.

Listing NGR: TQ2723185171

This List entry has been amended to add sources for War Memorials Online and the War Memorials Register. These sources were not used in the compilation of this List entry but are added here as a guide for further reading, 9 February 2017.