Old Town Hall

The Old Town Hall, built between 1851 and 1852 to the designs of Mr. Dixon, the town surveyor, is located in Torquay. Constructed from local grey Torquay limestone with rock-faced quoins and Bathstone dressings, the building features a concealed main roof behind parapets and a tiled hipped roof on the clock tower. It is designed in the Italianate style and sits on a wedge-shaped site between Abbey Road and Union Street, with entrances on both sides.

The exterior comprises two and three storeys, with a principal three-bay elevation facing Union Street and an additional bay for the tower on the left. Stone eaves brackets support the cornice, which is topped by a parapet. The first floor has a moulded string course and a platband on the second floor. The centre bay is slightly projected and features a pediment. There are segmental-headed doorways for each bay on the ground floor, while the first floor has three windows with stone architraves, pediments on consoles, and balustrades below the sills, with the centre window being tripartite. The left side has a two-storey block with a balustrade and a round-headed arcade. The rear elevation, facing Abbey Road, has a simpler design with a 1:3:1 bay arrangement.

The clock tower is a dramatic three-stage structure with a shallow hipped roof, featuring moulded projecting eaves on stone brackets and string courses. It has one-light and paired round-headed windows with stone architraves, a doorway on the Abbey Road side, an oculus on the Fleet Street side, and clock faces set in stone frames. A blue tiled street sign for Abbey Road with white letters is affixed to the building.

The interior is partly disused, with the rear section currently used as a restaurant, although many historic features have been removed or concealed. The Old Town Hall is prominently situated and is one of the earliest examples in Torquay of the Italianate tower, a style that became popular in larger villas built in the 1860s and 1870s.