Airdie Town House is a municipal building in Bank Street, Airdrie, North Lanarkshire, Scotland. The town house, which was the headquarters of Airdrie Burgh Council, is a Category B listed building.

History

In the early 19th century the burgh leaders met in the masonic hall, a building in the High Street, which had opened on 11 May 1810. The masonic lodge had over-extended itself with the borrowings needed to build the hall and was keen to maximise use of the building. After the area became of

burgh of barony A burgh of barony was a type of Scottish town (burgh). Burghs of barony were distinct from royal burghs, as the title was granted to a landowner who, as a tenant-in-chief, held his estates directly from the crown. (In some cases, they might also ...

in 1821, the burgh leaders decided to commission a dedicated municipal building for the town. The new town house was designed by Alexander Baird in the neoclassical style, built in

ashlar Ashlar () is finely dressed (cut, worked) stone, either an individual stone that has been worked until squared, or a structure built from such stones. Ashlar is the finest stone masonry unit, generally rectangular cuboid, mentioned by Vitruv ...

stone and completed in December 1826. The design involved a symmetrical main frontage with three bays facing onto Bank Street; the centre bay, which was slightly projected forward, featured a doorway on the ground floor flanked by two pairs of Tuscan order columns 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 ...

and a small canopy; there was a

sash window A sash window or hung sash window is made of one or more movable panels, or "sashes". The individual sashes are traditionally paned window (architecture), paned windows, but can now contain an individual sheet (or sheets, in the case of double gla ...

on the first floor. There was a tower above with a pedimented sash window in the next stage, followed by a clock, a belfry and then a spire. When completed it was high. Internally, the principal rooms were the courtroom and the police station. A bell was cast by Stephen Miller & Co of Glasgow and installed in the belfry in 1828, and the building went on to serve as a hospital during the

cholera Cholera is an infection of the small intestine by some strains of the bacterium ''Vibrio cholerae''. Symptoms may range from none, to mild, to severe. The classic symptom is large amounts of watery diarrhea that lasts a few days. Vomiting and ...

outbreak in 1832. The first free library in Scotland was established in one of the rooms in the building in 1854. However, the police station relocated to Anderson Street in 1858 and the library relocated to a purpose-built Carnegie library in Anderson Street in 1894. The town house had no public hall so public events had to be held in the

Airdrie Town Hall Airdie Town Hall, also known as the Sir John Wilson Town Hall, is an events venue in Stirling Street, Airdrie, North Lanarkshire, Scotland. It is a Category B listed building. History In the early 20th century, the administrative centre of the ...

which was only completed in 1912. The building was considerably extended to the rear in 1948, allowing the interior to be remodelled with a larger courtroom, which was also used as a council chamber, on the first floor. The building continued to serve as the headquarters of Airdrie Burgh Council for much of the 20th century but ceased to be the local seat of government after the enlarged

Monklands District Council Monklands (''Bad nam Manach'' in Scottish Gaelic) was, between 1975 and 1996, one of nineteen local government districts in the Strathclyde region of Scotland. The district was formed by the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973 from: *The burg ...

was formed at Coatbridge in 1975. The building was subsequently used as the local First Stop Shop, although the council announced the closure of the One Stop Shop in June 2020.

Notes

References

{{reflist Government buildings completed in 1826 Airdrie Airdrie, North Lanarkshire Category B listed buildings in North Lanarkshire Clock towers in the United Kingdom

History

See also

Notes

References