Kingdom Hall, With Classroom Wing, And Boundary Railings With Gates

Kingdom Hall, with Classroom Wing, and Boundary Railings with Gates

A meeting hall of Jehovah's Witnesses, originally built as a Congregational chapel. The main building dates to 1820, with galleries added in 1828. An attached classroom wing was constructed in 1836 and 1839, with further additions to the service areas. The building is constructed in Flemish bond brickwork to the front and English bond to the return walls, with an asbestos-cement slate roof.

The plan comprises a galleried chapel with portico, linked at the rear by a lobby to a long two-storey service wing offset to the left. The former chapel presents a two-storey three-bay front. The upper floor contains three arched sashes with 25 panes and radial heads. Below these are two 15-pane sashes flanking a projecting square porch. The porch features a central pair of panelled nineteenth-century doors set within an arched surround, approached by four sandstone steps. A cornice and stone blocking-course crown the porch. The main wall, which has been rebuilt in its upper parts, displays a rendered blocking-course above a single brick string course and a coped parapet, concealing a low-pitched hipped roof. Both return walls are plain; the right-hand wall has been rendered and contains a single sash near the back. The rear wall features a central sash with radial head, flanked by two blind arches in the upper part, with a 20-pane light positioned low on the left.

The interior has been extensively altered. A late twentieth-century suspended ceiling now conceals the roof at the level of the former balcony fronts, though the balcony seating is said to remain in place. The balconies, which run on three sides, are fronted by small fielded panels and are carried on slender cast-iron columns.

Across the full width of the front at pavement level stands a simple iron railing with fine wrought-iron central gates featuring an overthrow and side supporters. The railing returns to the front of the hall on the left and extends to the front of the adjacent property on the right.

The classroom wing is built in brick with a slate roof and includes a lean-to in brick with tile roof on the west side, linked to the main building by a gabled two-storey porch. The wing extends seven bays, with five lights and two blank panels at first-floor level, and five bays below with similar fenestration, including a door in the second bay. The outer face shows a series of blocked openings with segmental heads and stone cills at first-floor level, above three arched 9-pane lights with radial heads. A two-storey square block projects at the far end, featuring a panelled door with overlight. The gable toward the street is cement rendered. The gable at the outer end has a small blocked opening in the gable above two large blocked segmental-headed openings with cills at first-floor level and two twentieth-century casements at ground level. The interior of the wing was not inspected.

Historical records indicate that the classroom wing was built at a cost of approximately £900, according to Bennett's History of Tewkesbury (1830). The wing may have served as a factory at some stage in its history.