The Guildhall

The Guildhall is a mid-18th century building located on Market Street in Poole. It was constructed in 1761 for John Gultson and Colonel Thomas Calcraft, both Members of Parliament for Poole, their names inscribed on tablets on the returns. The building was restored in 1994. It is a brick structure with limestone and stucco dressings, topped with a hipped slate roof, a flat leaded top, and a cupola.

The building is of mid-Georgian style, with a rectangular plan and a seven-window range. The front of the building features rusticated quoins, a plat band, and a flat cornice, with a pediment raised at the corners to form side parapets. A projecting Tuscan portico with a front balustrade, antae, and pediment sits above a rusticated base with a blocked, keyed round arch. Fine curved steps and iron railings rise each side to the portico. The first-floor windows are keyed segmental arches with 6/6-pane sashes. A clock is housed within the pediment, set within a keyed architrave, and a sundial features a gnomon and the number XII at the apex of the pediment. The sides exhibit a formerly open ground-floor arcade connected by impost blocks, along with first-floor keyed windows. The rear elevation on Orchard Street has two windows and two arches.

The cupola's domed ridge has concave corners, a wide modillion eaves cornice, and round-arched windows with rusticated architraves.

The interior Guildhall includes a first-floor council chamber with a rear platform and doorway with an architrave and console pediment, beneath a coat of arms of Queen Victoria. A central fireplace is present, masked externally by a blind window, with an enriched surround and an overmantel with a broken pediment over an eared panel containing pre-1603 Royal Arms. The ceiling is divided by moulded bands, with a central lantern and an enriched coved cornice. The ground floor features cast-iron columns along the centre. The building is a fine example of a Georgian guildhall, reflecting the 18th-century wealth of Poole, and served as a model for the Custom House. The ground floor originally contained an open market.