Hornsey Town Hall

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TQ 3088 33/290

BROADWAY N8 (east side) Hornsey Town Hall

II*

1935 by R H Uren. Forms, centrepiece of composition around small green, flanked by Gas Board and Electricity Board showroom. Hand made brick of pinkish colour with stone dressings; flat roofs, stone coped parapets. Modern style combined with display of craftsmanship. Two storeys. L- shaped front with seven bays facing courtyard, six narrower bays on right inner return with a set back attic floor (perhaps later); tall rectangular tower at junction. Main block has long first floor windows with bronze bars and guards and bronze balcony to three central windows. Below, a wide triple entrance with rusticated brickwork is flanked by plain windows. Tower has large door with carved stone surround below a copper-grilled window with bronze hood. Blank walls, with raised brick strips, rise to top stage where stone hoods crown five and four slit windows. At North end projects a bowed, cantilevered first floor. Rear: round-cornered canopies to entrances flanking the stair tower which has curved full-height window with glazing bars; oversailing flat roof.

Interior decoration and furnishing all designed as part of the original conception and much is still preserved including: floor surfaces; wall cladding; columns; doors, light-fittings; imperial main stair. with decorative openwork metal balustrade; and inlaid wood-panelled walls (with clocks), cupboards, and bookcases to' Borough Engineer's Office, Room 108, former Mayor's Parlour and Committee Room. Council Chamber retains original seats and desks (set in half-round). Galleried theatre with inlaid wood-panelling to walls.

R H Uren was a RIBA Architecture Medal winner and winner of the Gold Medal of the Worshipful Company of Tylers and Bricklayers. This was the first town hall in Britain to be modelled on Dudock's seminal town hall at Hilversum, and was an important influence on others built subsequently.

Listing NGR: TQ3018288324