Municipal Buildings And Public Library, 98-102 Cadzow Street, Hamilton

Begun Alexander Cullen 1906-07 (library section) resumed

1912, opened July 1914, hall added 1928 Cullen Lochhead

and Brown. Edwardian Baroque of EA Rickards School, 2-

storey and 2-storeys of basements quadrangular plan.

Main south-west elevation 17 bays, broad central

entrance bay projects boldly with concave angles,

channel-jointed with wide entrance door framed in Doric

columns and broad-channelled pilasters and approached

by steps within concave parapets flanked by ornamental

cast-iron standards; arched trompe window above with

swagged keyblock framed in broad Ionic pilasters and

segmental pediment with armorial panel, solid attic

above with lions heads; 5 flanking bays to either side

have balustraded basement areas, round arched ground

floor windows with quintuple keyblocks, architraved

first floor windows with canted aprons set in coupled

Ionic columns and balustraded parapets; 3rd and 15th

bays side entrance bays are slightly advanced, astylar

and channel-jointed throughout with 1st floor balconies

on console brackets, and solid panelled parapets, 2nd

and 16th bays are boldly advanced 4-storey stair towers

with pilaster strips, long windows on front face, giant

trompe arches encompass upper two stages, breaking

through pediments to domed octagonal top stages, the

splayed sides concave with urns; end bays echo Ionic

treatment of intermediate bays on a different plane set

back slightly from the line of the towers, single Ionic

columns set in channelled pilaster strips with bold urns

over semi-octagonal piers at the angles. South east

elevation 8 bays, end bays giant channel-pilastered and

pedimented, ground floor windows arched with quintuple

keyblocks, upper windows doric columned and linked by

swags to circular attic windows, all within shallow

Ionic arched recesses. Inner bays have similar treatment

to intermediate bays of main front but with panelled

Doric pilasters instead of Ionic columns and an

unchannelled treatment at ground floor, the arched

windows of which extend downwards to encompass the

paired windows at upper basement level; balustraded

parapet to park at lower basement level. North west

elevation returns with similar treatment to front of

Town Hall, 5-bay front with channel-pilastered and

balustraded stair towers of the same height enclosing a

single storey 3-bay portico of coupled Doric columns:

recessed 3-bay centre gable rises a storey higher,

segmentally arched 2nd floor windows with swagged

keyblocks, broken segmental pediment against segmental

gable.