The Old Town Hall is a former town hall in

Burslem Burslem ( ) is one of the six towns that along with Hanley, Staffordshire, Hanley, Tunstall, Staffordshire, Tunstall, Fenton, Staffordshire, Fenton, Longton, Staffordshire, Longton and Stoke-upon-Trent form part of the city of Stoke-on-Trent in ...

, in

Staffordshire Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation ''Staffs''.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England. It borders Cheshire to the north-west, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, ...

, England. It is in the Market Place, in the centre of the town. It is a Grade II*

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 ...

, listed on 2 October 1951.

History

The first town hall in the town, erected in the centre of the Market Place in 1761, was a rectangular two-storey building with open arches on the ground floor, a meeting hall on the first floor and a clock tower with a

cupola In architecture, a cupola () is a relatively small, usually dome-like structure on top of a building often crowning a larger roof or dome. Cupolas often serve as a roof lantern to admit light and air or as a lookout. The word derives, via Ital ...

on top. It was demolished to make way for the second town hall which was built on the same site. The second town hall, now referred to as the "Old Town Hall", which was designed by G. T. Robinson of

Wolverhampton Wolverhampton ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands (county), West Midlands of England. Located around 12 miles (20 km) north of Birmingham, it forms the northwestern part of the West Midlands conurbation, with the towns of ...

in the

Baroque style The Baroque ( , , ) is a Western style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished from the early 17th century until the 1750s. It followed Renaissance art and Mannerism and preceded the Rococo (i ...

, was built between 1854 and 1857. It was designed with paired Corinthian

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 for the height of the upper storey, above which a

cornice In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative Moulding (decorative), moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, ar ...

surmounted by acroteria was placed. At the west end a projecting

portico A portico is a porch leading to the entrance of a building, or extended as a colonnade, with a roof structure over a walkway, supported by columns or enclosed by walls. This idea was widely used in ancient Greece and has influenced many cu ...

with arched entrances, was erected above which Corinthian columns were placed; above these, caryatids supported an octagonal clock turret (containing an hour-striking clock by Smith of Derby) with a gilded angel

finial A finial () or hip-knob is an element marking the top or end of some object, often formed to be a decorative feature. In architecture, it is a small decorative device, employed to emphasize the Apex (geometry), apex of a dome, spire, tower, roo ...

. The town hall became the headquarters of the new borough of Burslem in 1878 but it ceased to be the local seat of government when the

Federation of Stoke-on-Trent The federation of Stoke-on-Trent was the 1910 amalgamation of the six Staffordshire Potteries towns of Burslem, Tunstall, Staffordshire, Tunstall, Stoke-upon-Trent, Hanley, Staffordshire, Hanley, Fenton, Staffordshire, Fenton and Longton, Staffor ...

was formed in March 1910. The old town hall was used as a public library for much of the 20th century. It was used for scenes in the film ''

The Card ''The Card'' is a comic novel written by Arnold Bennett in 1911 (entitled ''Denry the Audacious'' in the American edition). It was later made into a 1952 movie, starring Alec Guinness and Petula Clark. Like much of Bennett's best work, it is ...

'' starring

Alec Guinness Sir Alec Guinness (born Alec Guinness de Cuffe; 2 April 1914 – 5 August 2000) was an English actor. In the BFI, British Film Institute listing of 1999 of BFI Top 100 British films, the 100 most important British films of the 20th century ...

in 1952, and although there were proposals to demolish it in the 1960s, it survived and had become a recreation centre by the 1990s. The gilded angel was restored and re-gilded by Bailey International Steeplejacks in

Macclesfield Macclesfield () is a market town and civil parish in the unitary authority of Cheshire East, Cheshire, England. It is sited on the River Bollin and the edge of the Cheshire Plain, with Macclesfield Forest to its east; the town lies south of Ma ...

in December 2000. From 2003 the building housed Ceramica, a visitor centre showing the artistic and industrial heritage of the Potteries. The project was funded by the

Millennium Commission The Millennium Commission, a United Kingdom public body, was set up to celebrate the turn of the millennium. It used funding raised through the UK National Lottery to assist communities in marking the close of the second millennium and celebra ...

. Part of the budget had to be spent in dealing with dry rot found in the building. The exhibition attracted fewer visitors than anticipated, and after Stoke-on-Trent City Council withdrew funding for day-to-day running, it closed in March 2011. The building remained empty until 2015, when the modern extension built as part of the Ceramica exhibition was demolished and the Old Town Hall was converted into a

sixth form college A sixth form college (pre-university college in Malaysia) is an educational institution, where students aged 16 to 19 study typically for advanced post-school level qualifications such as GCE Advanced Level, A Levels, Business and Technology Edu ...

of Haywood Academy, a project sponsored by Steelite International.

Notes

References

{{Stoke-on-Trent Buildings and structures in Stoke-on-Trent Grade II* listed buildings in Staffordshire City and town halls in Staffordshire Former seats of local government Government buildings completed in 1857