Dorset County Museum

The Dorset County Museum was built between 1881 and 1883. It was designed by G R Crickmay and Son of Weymouth. The building is constructed of Portland stone with Ham stone dressings, and has a pitched slate roof. It is two storeys high and exhibits a crenellated parapet and two horizontal stringcourses. A moulded batter is present at the level of the first-floor window sills, and moulded dripstones are found at the eaves.

The central bay is a shallow two-storey canted projection, featuring a seven-light mullion and transom window. The upper window has two transoms and Perpendicular tracery in the upper lights. Above this is a gable with moulded coping, displaying a three-light mullion and transom window with a hoodmould. A trefoil-headed panel displays the Borough Arms and the date 1881. The right-hand bay has a single-light window with a transom and Perpendicular tracery on the ground floor. A nearly circular four-light oriel window is situated on the corner of the first floor, supported by carved foliate squinches, with a stringcourse that serves as a transom. It has Perpendicular tracery in the upper lights, an ornamental frieze, and a battered stone roof. The left-hand bay features panelled double doors set within a deeply moulded four-centred arch, with circles and foliage in the spandrels. Above the doors are three panels with escutcheons displaying arms, flanked by two slender buttresses of square section, diagonally set, with applied ogee gablets and traceried panels, topped by crocketed finials. A single-light window with a transom and Perpendicular tracery sits above the entrance. The chimneys have end stacks attached to polygonal shafts with cornicing.

The interior contains an aisled hall supported by cast iron columns, which carry galleries above the aisles and semi-circular transverse arches to the roof. There are elaborate tracery patterns to the main trusses and brackets spanning the aisle bays.

The museum forms part of a group of buildings alongside the Shire Hall, Holy Trinity Church, St. Peter’s Church and the monument to William Barnes in the churchyard.