Stoke Newington Town Hall

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Stoke Newington Town Hall

Middlesex


The Assembly Hall section of Stoke Newington Town Hall
Type: Former town hall
Location
Grid reference: TQ32968648
Location: 51°33’41"N, 0°4’60"W
Town: Stoke Newington
History
Address: Church Street
Built 1937
By: John Reginald Truelove
Former town hall
Renaissance (Municipal Offices) /
Classical (Town Hall and
Assembly Hall)
Information

Stoke Newington Town Hall is a municipal building in Church Street, Stoke Newington, Middlesex, which served as the town hall for Stoke Newington for nearly thirty years, from the 1930s until the 1960s.

It is a Grade II listed building.[1]

History

The Municipal Offices section of Stoke Newington Town Hall

The building was commissioned to replace an aging facility in Milton Grove.[2] The site chosen had previously been occupied by a 15th-century Manor House and later by a row of Georgian houses.[2]

The new building was designed by John Reginald Truelove and was completed in 1937.[1] It consisted of a curved section of municipal offices, which contains the council chamber, built in the Renaissance style to the west and a rectangular assembly hall with four huge Doric columns flanked by pavilions built in the Classical style to the east.[1] A sprung Canadian maple dance floor installed in the assembly hall allowing it to be used as a dance facility.[3]

Diring the Second World War, the building served as the local civil defence headquarters and was heavily camouflaged to protect it from enemy bombing during the Blitz.[4]

The town hall served as the headquarters of the 'Metropolitan Borough of Stoke Newington', but in 1965 that council was abolished and the town hall ceased to be the local seat of government, all functions passing to a giant Hackney Council. The council chamber was subsequently used as a storeroom and the assembly hall was closed, due to its state of disrepair in 1999.[3]

The building was extensively refurbished and restored to a design by Hawkins\Brown in 2010: the works included extensive repairs to the council chamber and the assembly hall was modernised.[5] The quality of the work was recognised by the Worshipful Company of Carpenters in that year's Wood Awards.[6][7]

References