Town Hall, The Crescent, Portstewart, BT55 7AB

Portstewart Town Hall is a symmetrical two-storey-with-attic Modernist building in red brick with concrete dressings, designed by local architect Benjamin Cowser and built in 1934–35. It stands prominently at the junction of The Crescent and The Promenade in Portstewart town centre, overlooking the seafront, and is sited adjacent to St Mary's Star of the Sea Church. It is one of the most distinctive surviving 1930s buildings in the district, and a confident interpretation of the Modernist style with a strong geometric emphasis. Now in use as a library, the building was recently refurbished with some alterations and replacement fabric, though the integrity of the original design is largely intact.

The building has a rectangular plan with recessed end bays and a two-storey and single-storey extension to the rear, added later. The roof is red Roman-tiled and hipped, with rounded ridge tiles, leaded verges, and projecting eaves fitted with plastic rainwater goods. A concrete pinnacle on a square base sits centrally on the ridgeline. The walls are stretcher-bonded red brick with a heavy concrete frieze incorporating a classical motif in relief, a continuous sill course at ground floor level, and a smooth rendered fascia at the northwest elevation.

The windows throughout are replacement timber casements. Those at first floor level are narrower and set within cast concrete architraves; ground floor windows have chamfered concrete sills.

The principal northwest-facing façade is symmetrical and horizontally emphatic, with five elongated closely spaced windows at first floor level and seven evenly and more widely spaced openings at ground floor level, the two floors divided by a smooth rendered painted fascia. At the far left and right are narrow window openings at each floor level. The fascia carries decorative lugged detailing at its base and painted lettering reading "PORTSTEWART TOWN HALL". The central entrance comprises a recessed double-leaf three-panelled mahogany door in the Modernist style, fitted with slender curved metal pull handles, surmounted by a transom light, and set within a large cast concrete architrave. To its right is a modern glazed door with transom light, which has replaced an original window opening. Both entrances are reached via concrete steps, with ramped access at the left. The recessed end bays are one narrow window wide at each floor.

The northeast elevation, which faces The Promenade and is accessed at first floor level via a ramp, is dominated by a principal entrance opening of double-panelled timber doors flanked by timber side panels, all contained within a moulded concrete architrave. There are diminutive windows to the left and right at first floor and attic level, with rebated brick patterns between the floors. A modern timber door is located at ground floor right. An inscribed concrete plaque above the entrance reads "PORTSTEWART / TOWN HALL / ERECTED 1934 / RENOVATED 1973".

The southeast rear elevation is abutted at its centre by a lower two-storey extension housing public toilets, accessed via a walkway from The Promenade. To the right of the return there is a variety of irregularly arranged replacement timber casement windows; to the left is a single-storey red brick extension in a similar style. The walkway has a raised red brick base and is enclosed by red brick walls with lattice concrete blocks and concrete coping. The southwest elevation has a window at mid-level to the left, three closely grouped windows at ground floor centre, a window at first floor on the left cheek, a concealed right cheek, and a window at mid-level in the left bay.

The setting includes low red brick boundary walls with concrete coping and simple square red brick piers with concrete caps at the northwest entrances. The grounds are lawned to the front with concrete flagstone pathways.

The Town Hall was built following an architectural competition won by Benjamin Cowser; his future partner and a working colleague placed second and third respectively. Cowser was primarily a domestic architect but also designed a bank in Belfast and a Masonic Hall in Enniskillen, and in later life pursued a brief career as an artist. Construction was carried out by contractor F. B. McKee & Co., and the building was officially opened on 30th May 1935 by Lady Craigavon, wife of the then Prime Minister of Northern Ireland, with a luncheon for one hundred guests held in the hall afterwards. The total construction cost was £8,000, built on a site purchased for £1,000 in 1933. The public lavatories, of the penny-in-the-slot type, were estimated to cost an additional £1,000, and a public shelter of brick, wood, glass and concrete was built for £200 and presented to the town. The building entered the valuation records in 1936 at a valuation of £180; the public lavatory and adjoining shelter were exempted.

When first built, the ground floor contained a reading room, minor hall, council room, town clerk's offices (public and private), surveyor's office, electrical manager's office, three store rooms, a heating chamber, a strong room, and three lavatories. The first floor housed the concert hall, balcony, stage, two lavatories for the concert hall, a box office, a tank room, two dressing rooms with WC, a kitchen, and the caretaker's living quarters comprising two bedrooms, a kitchen, and a bathroom. The hall had a total capacity of 380 people — 246 in the body of the hall and 134 in the balcony. For the summer season of 1935 the hall was let to concert parties at £75 and was used for dances in the winter. At the time of first valuation, the official valuer remarked: "The building is thoroughly modern and is probably one of the best of its kind in Northern Ireland... The building has been designed and completed to meet the requirements of the town 50 years hence. It is much too large for Portstewart today. The greater portion of the rooms are not in use at all nor will be needed for many years to come."

By the early 1970s part of the ground floor was in use as a library, as it remains today. In 1973 the hall underwent a major renovation, as recorded on the inscribed plaque above the northeast entrance. The building was listed in 1991, and in 2000 underwent a further renovation during which the former balcony to the front façade was removed and replaced with a plain fascia, the spire was replaced, and the windows and main entrance doors were also replaced.