King Arthur's Great Halls

This remarkable building has a complex history spanning three centuries. At its core is the cellar of a 17th-century structure, above which a house was built in the 1860s for JD Cook. The house was altered and extended in the late 19th century, then dramatically transformed between 1927 and 1933 by architect Frederick Thomas Glasscock into King Arthur's Great Halls, which served as headquarters for the Fellowship of the Knights of the Round Table.

Materials and Construction

The building is constructed of roughly-coursed slate stone with granite and red-brick dressings. A rear extension is rendered with markings imitating ashlar stonework. The roofs are slate, with slate-stone chimney stacks featuring moulded caps at the gable ends. South-facing dormer windows are clad in slate hanging. Inside the Great Exhibition Hall, a remarkable variety of Cornish building stones and granite are used extensively throughout.

Layout

The building runs north to south and comprises three main sections. The southern portion is two storeys with a basement and attic, featuring a central ground-floor entrance with staircases ascending to the west and descending to the east. The middle section is a double-height open rectangular space, which connects to a single-storey corridor (known as 'the galleries') wrapping around three sides of the double-height rectangular hall at the northern end.

The different sections have often been called by various names interchangeably. For clarity, the southern section is referred to here as the former house, the central part as King Arthur's Hall, and the large northern hall as the Great Exhibition Hall.

Exterior

South Elevation

The principal frontage comprises two storeys plus an attic, with a symmetrical three-bay arrangement. At the centre is a two-storey canted bay containing the main entrance. This is flanked on the ground floor by canted bay windows with parapets and mullions and transoms, each topped by a four-light mullioned and transomed window at first-floor level. The attic features two full dormer windows with hipped roofs positioned either side of a central corbelled gable containing a two-light window. Below this gable is a carved stone Masonic shield. The central entrance has an arched doorway flanked by two lancet windows, with a moulded drip course above.

East Elevation

This elevation is two storeys high. To the south, it is defined by the two gable ends of the former house and King Arthur's Hall; to the north, by the lower extension of the Great Exhibition Hall. The section relating to King Arthur's Hall has irregular window placement and two blocked openings, all with brick lintels. The Great Exhibition Hall portion features a projecting block with a ground floor of coursed slate stone set with arches containing two doors flanking two lunette windows, all separated by granite shields. The remainder of this block is rendered, with three further windows and four shields at first-floor level, rising to a modillioned eaves cornice. North of this, the ground floor projects and has inset lunette windows and a hipped roof, rising to further windows at the upper level of the hall.

West and North Elevations

The west elevation adjoins the Wharncliffe Hotel and is otherwise inaccessible. The projecting ground floor wraps around to the north elevation, where there are central double doors. Above these are the three large windows illuminating the Great Exhibition Hall. The gable end features granite ashlar quoins rising to kneelers.

Interior

Former House

A small lobby from the front entrance provides access through a later-20th-century door to the ground floor, which is currently one open space used as a gift shop. On either side of the entrance, a semi-circular arch springs from columns positioned in front of the bay windows, which have timber-panelled reveals. To the east, two arched doorways lead to a cupboard and the basement stairs. To the west, an archway leads to the main staircase, which has an open arch on one side. The north wall contains two large blocked arches and a central arched doorway flanked by timber and wrought-iron sconces; studded timber double doors lead through to King Arthur's Hall. The space is lit by two simple brass-wrought chandeliers, probably dating from around 1927.

Stone stairs descend to the basement, which comprises a three-cell space forming the cellar of the old market house. The walls are rubble stone and the floors are slate flags. The timber ceiling structure probably dates to the 1860s when Trevena House was built by Cook. The central bay has corbelled stone vaulting running north to south, cut through by a passageway. The resulting two compartments, north and south, appear to have once had doors.

The staircase to the first floor (which appears to have been repositioned) leads to one open space used as a dining hall, with a small modern kitchen partitioned off at the east end. This partition cuts through an ovolo-moulded timber lintel above the south-facing window. The attic comprises multiple small rooms above the former house and King Arthur's Hall. Three attic rooms contain fireplaces with stone surrounds set with cast-iron grates, and the staircases retain 19th-century joinery. Some other joinery survives, including moulded architraves and panelled doors, alongside moulded plaster cornices. The floors are boarded throughout.

King Arthur's Hall

This double-height space encompasses the rear part of the former house. The walls are lined with an internal timber skin, set at the east and west ends with arched windows containing leaded lights decorated with blue fleur-de-lys. The space is spanned by a barrel-vaulted and panelled timber ceiling with moulded oak ribs and drop pendants. To the north and south are double doors with leaded lights and blue-coloured fleur-de-lys in their panels and fanlights above.

At the east end, steps lead to a raised dais flanked by curved screens with a hood above. At the west end is a further curved screen and hood topped with a dragon. Mounted on the screen within fixed frames are four of ten paintings attributed to William Hatherell which tell the story of King Arthur and his Knights. The other six are displayed within fixed frames on the north and south walls of the hall.

The north and south walls and the double doors are covered with a red and gold patterned wallpaper fabric. The grey carpet with a darker-grey circle representing the location of the timber round table is said to date from 1927. All elements of the hall are decorated with medieval-style motifs such as Gothic crosses and fleur-de-lys. Flags, shields and pennants bearing the arms of the Knights, along with a replica anvil and sword, are also fixed as decorative features from 1927.

Great Exhibition Hall and Galleries

On the north side of King Arthur's Hall, slate steps lead to a corridor and lobby which in turn leads to the outer galleries (or corridors) surrounding the Great Exhibition Hall. The gallery walls are of coursed Tintagel stone, the floors are slate, and the timber barrel-vaulted ceiling continues here.

Within the lobby, which has a panelled timber ceiling, is an arched doorway to the galleries, a side entrance, and a stone dog-leg staircase with a metal handrail ascending to a mezzanine where toilets are located. On the south and east walls are small lunette stained-glass windows by Veronica Whall, which include depictions of the badge of the Fellowship and rosemary, the latter being a symbol of remembrance to past members of the Fellowship. Throughout the lobby and galleries, plain granite shields are inset into the walls and there are further wall sconces on decorative iron brackets.

To the west, the corridor has been enclosed as a storage area; there are two further lunette windows by Whall in this space. The galleries wrap around the Great Exhibition Hall, and on their outer walls are 49 further lunette windows by Whall. Each has a different central heraldic device surrounded by panes of wave-patterned acid-etched flash glass. The windows in the west gallery which adjoin the neighbouring building are lit by electric bulbs and designed with one hinged pane for maintenance access. In the north gallery, two of the windows contain scripts representing the promises required to be welcomed into the Fellowship, and here there is also an arched doorway with later-20th-century external double doors. At the south end of the west gallery, a slate ramp has been inserted to provide alternative access via the gift shop to the halls.

The main entrance to the Great Exhibition Hall is at the south-west end of the east gallery through an arched doorway. There is a further doorway at the north-west end, with doorways opposite each on the west side of the hall. The double-height hall is nine bays long from north to south. The walls are faced with Polyphant stone above a dado of coursed Tintagel stone, which is also used for dressings. The ceiling is waggon-vaulted to the same design as that in King Arthur's Hall. Decorative pendant lights hang in two rows from the ceiling.

The floor is laid with Polyphant stone with inlaid circular roundels signifying the Round Table in red mottled porphyry, and crosses of the Knights in white elvan. On the east and west walls at high level are 18 lunette windows depicting the virtues by Veronica Whall. Below each of these are sets of four shields, each carved from a different Cornish stone.

At the ends of the hall are three large windows by Veronica Whall. These represent the worldly quest of the Knights of the Round Table at the south end, and their spiritual quest and the discovery of the Holy Grail by Sir Galahad at the north end. At the north end of the hall, steps lead up to a large throne carved with a Celtic cross, surrounded by a colonnade of nine piers and topped with a canopy; each pier is carved from a different Cornish granite. On top of the canopy are a rough granite block, anvil and sword. In front of the throne complex, on a roundel of red porphyry, stands a granite Round Table measuring eight feet in diameter with Doric-column legs.

The two end bays at the north and south of the hall are partitioned by curtains. Further timber sconces on decorative iron brackets are fixed to the walls. The original bronze light switches survive and are neatly recessed into the Polyphant walls.