Barrhead Burgh Hall, also known as Barrhead Burgh Court Hall and Burgh Chambers and as the James McGuire Building, is a municipal complex in Main Street,

Barrhead Barrhead (, ) is a town in East Renfrewshire, Scotland, southwest of Glasgow city centre on the edge of the Gleniffer Braes. At the 2011 census its population was 17,268. History Barrhead was formed when a series of small textile-produ ...

East Renfrewshire East Renfrewshire (; ) is one of 32 council areas of Scotland. It was formed in 1996, as a successor to the Eastwood (district), Eastwood district of the Strathclyde region. The northeastern part of the council area is close to Glasgow and ma ...

, Scotland. The complex was the headquarters of Barrhead Burgh Council. It consists of two distinct buildings separated by an iron gate: Barrhead Burgh Court Hall, which is a Category C

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

, and, Barrhead Burgh Chambers, which is also a Category C listed building, although, as a group, they are listed at Category B.

History

After significant population growth, largely associated with the manufacturing industries, Barrhead became a

police burgh A police burgh was a Scottish burgh which had adopted a "police system" for governing the town. They existed from 1833 to 1975. The 1833 act The first police burghs were created under the Burgh Police (Scotland) Act 1833 ( 3 & 4 Will. 4. c. 46 ...

in 1894. In this context, the new civic leaders decided to procure municipal offices for the burgh: the site they selected in Main Street was owned by Zechariah John Heys who chose to donate it to the town. Heys was the town's second provost and the owner of the South Arthurlie Printworks. Work started on the new complex in 1902. It was designed by Ninian MacWhannell and John Rogerson in the

Renaissance style Renaissance architecture is the European architecture of the period between the early 15th and early 16th centuries in different regions, demonstrating a conscious revival and development of certain elements of Ancient Greece, ancient Greek and ...

, built in

rubble masonry Rubble masonry or rubble stone is rough, uneven building stone not laid in regular courses. It may fill the core of a wall which is faced with unit masonry such as brick or ashlar. Some medieval cathedral walls have outer shells of ashlar wi ...

by the local contracting firm, Houston and Young, and was officially opened on 15 April 1904. The design of the burgh court hall involved an asymmetrical main frontage with three bays facing onto Main Street; the left hand bay featured an

oriel window An oriel window is a form of bay window which protrudes from the main wall of a building but does not reach to the ground. Supported by corbels, bracket (architecture), brackets, or similar cantilevers, an oriel window generally projects from an ...

with a

stepped gable A stepped gable, crow-stepped gable, or corbie step is a stairstep type of design at the top of the triangular gable-end of a building. The top of the parapet wall projects above the roofline and the top of the brick or stone wall is stacked in ...

above, while the right hand bay featured a circular tower with a doorway flanked by

pilaster In architecture, a pilaster is both a load-bearing section of thickened wall or column integrated into a wall, and a purely decorative element in classical architecture which gives the appearance of a supporting column and articulates an ext ...

s supporting an

entablature An entablature (; nativization of Italian , from "in" and "table") is the superstructure of moldings and bands which lies horizontally above columns, resting on their capitals. Entablatures are major elements of classical architecture, and ...

on the ground floor: there was a rectangular

balcony A balcony (from , "scaffold") is a platform projecting from the wall of a building, supported by columns or console brackets, and enclosed with a balustrade, usually above the ground floor. They are commonly found on multi-level houses, apartme ...

with a window in the next stage and a semi-circular balcony with a window flanked by clock faces in the final stage. The tower was surmounted by a conical roof. Internally the principal room in the building was the courtroom. The design of the burgh chambers involved an asymmetrical main frontage with two bays facing onto Main Street; on the ground floor there was a central doorway flanked by pilasters supporting an entablature and a carved

coat of arms A coat of arms is a heraldry, heraldic communication design, visual design on an escutcheon (heraldry), escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the last two being outer garments), originating in Europe. The coat of arms on an escutcheon f ...

. The right hand bay featured a

Diocletian window Diocletian windows, also called thermal windows, are large semicircular windows characteristic of the enormous public baths (''thermae'') of Ancient Rome. They have been revived on a limited basis by some neo-classical architecture, classical rev ...

on the first floor and both bays had stepped gables. Internally, the principal rooms in the building were the council chamber and the burgh treasurer's office. The area was advanced to the status of small burgh with the burgh hall as its headquarters in 1930. The complex continued to serve as the headquarters of the burgh council for much of the 20th century, but ceased to be the local seat of government when the enlarged Renfrew District Council was formed in 1975. The complex continued to operate as the local police station until the police service relocated to Bank Street, but it was then brought back into use as a community centre, the Main Street Centre, in 1995. In its capacity as a community centre, the structure was renamed the James McGuire Building in March 1996. McGuire had been the provost of Barrhead and the owner of a local butchers' business. The complex then served as a work and employability centre until the centre moved to the Barrhead Foundry in January 2015. After remaining vacant for some five years, it was brought back into use as a community hub again in March 2020.

References

{{reflist Government buildings completed in 1904 City chambers and town halls in Scotland Barrhead Category C listed buildings in East Renfrewshire Clock towers in the United Kingdom

History

See also

References