Cardigan Guildhall ( cy, Neuadd y Dref Aberteifi), is a municipal building in Pendre,

Cardigan, Ceredigion Cardigan ( cy, Aberteifi, ) is both a town and a community in the county of Ceredigion, Wales. Positioned on the tidal reach of the River Teifi at the point where Ceredigion meets Pembrokeshire, Cardigan was the county town of the historic cou ...

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the Wales–England border, east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the ...

. The structure, which is now used as an art gallery and community events venue, is a Grade II*

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

History

The first municipal building in the town was a market hall which was commissioned by a local

publican In antiquity, publicans (Greek τελώνης ''telōnēs'' (singular); Latin ''publicanus'' (singular); ''publicani'' (plural)) were public contractors, in whose official capacity they often supplied the Roman legions and military, managed the ...

, William Phillips, and erected in Market Lane in 1823. By the mid-19th century, the old market hall had become inadequate and civic leaders decided to commission a larger structure: the site they selected in Pendre was occupied by the local grammar school and by a house and a coach-house owned by a local businessman, Abraham Morgan. The foundation stone for the new building was laid by the mayor, Richard David Jenkins, on 8 July 1858. It was designed by

Robert Jewell Withers Robert Jewell Withers (1824–1894) was an English ecclesiastical architect. Early life Robert Jewell Withers was born on 2 February 1824 in Shepton Mallet, Somerset, England. His father was John Alexander Withers and his mother, Maria Jewell. ...

in the

Gothic Revival style Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic, neo-Gothic, or Gothick) is an architectural movement that began in the late 1740s in England. The movement gained momentum and expanded in the first half of the 19th century, as increasingly ...

, built by local builders, David Jenkins, John Davies and John Thomas of

Cilgerran Cilgerran (previously Kilgerran or Cil-Garon) is both a village, a parish, and also a community, situated on the south bank of the River Teifi in Pembrokeshire, Wales. It was formerly an incorporated market town. Among Cilgerran's attractions ar ...

Blue Lias The Blue Lias is a geological formation in southern, eastern and western England and parts of South Wales, part of the Lias Group. The Blue Lias consists of a sequence of limestone and shale layers, laid down in latest Triassic and early Jurassi ...

stone at a cost of £4,055 and was officially opened on 9 July 1860. The design involved an asymmetrical main frontage with seven bays facing onto Pendre; the main hall section, formed by the five bays on the right which were slightly projected forward, featured arched openings on the ground floor and

mullion A mullion is a vertical element that forms a division between units of a window or screen, or is used decoratively. It is also often used as a division between double doors. When dividing adjacent window units its primary purpose is a rigid supp ...

ed and transomed windows with

hood mould In architecture, a hood mould, hood, label mould (from Latin ''labia'', lip), drip mould or dripstone, is an external moulded projection from a wall over an opening to throw off rainwater, historically often in form of a ''pediment''. This mouldin ...

s on the first floor. The first bay on the left, which was gabled and also slightly projected forward, was fenestrated by a single window on the ground floor and by a pair of

cross window A cross-window is a window whose lights are defined by a mullion and a transom, forming a cross.Curl, James Stevens (2006). ''Oxford Dictionary of Architecture and Landscape Architecture'', 2nd ed., OUP, Oxford and New York, p. 214. . The Late ...

s on the first floor, while the second bay of the left featured an arched doorway on the ground floor and a single window on the first floor. At roof level, the main section was covered by a

mansard roof A mansard or mansard roof (also called a French roof or curb roof) is a four-sided gambrel-style hip roof characterised by two slopes on each of its sides, with the lower slope, punctured by dormer windows, at a steeper angle than the upper. The ...

. Internally, the principal rooms were the corn exchange on the ground floor and the great hall on the first floor. The guildhall was one of the first buildings in the UK to adopt the principles of Gothic Architecture contained in the book by the art critic,

John Ruskin John Ruskin (8 February 1819 20 January 1900) was an English writer, philosopher, art critic and polymath of the Victorian era. He wrote on subjects as varied as geology, architecture, myth, ornithology, literature, education, botany and politi ...

, who claimed that "nothing can possibly be better or more graceful" than a well-constructed Venetian Gothic arch. A Russian cannon, which had been captured during the

charge of the Light Brigade The Charge of the Light Brigade was a failed military action involving the British light cavalry led by Lord Cardigan against Russian forces during the Battle of Balaclava on 25 October 1854 in the Crimean War. Lord Raglan had intended to se ...

, led by

Lord Cardigan Earl of Cardigan is a title in the Peerage of England, currently held by the Marquess of Ailesbury, Marquesses of Ailesbury, and used as a Courtesy titles in the United Kingdom, courtesy title by the heir apparent to that Marquessate, currentl ...

against Russian forces during the

Battle of Balaclava The Battle of Balaclava, fought on 25 October 1854 during the Crimean War, was part of the Siege of Sevastopol (1854–55), an Allied attempt to capture the port and fortress of Sevastopol, Russian Empire, Russia's principal naval base on the Bl ...

in October 1854 in the

Crimean War The Crimean War, , was fought from October 1853 to February 1856 between Russia and an ultimately victorious alliance of the Ottoman Empire, France, the United Kingdom and Piedmont-Sardinia. Geopolitical causes of the war included the de ...

, was installed outside the building in 1871. In the early 1890s, a clock tower with a

pyramid A pyramid (from el, πυραμίς ') is a structure whose outer surfaces are triangular and converge to a single step at the top, making the shape roughly a pyramid in the geometric sense. The base of a pyramid can be trilateral, quadrilat ...

-shaped roof was installed above the second bay on the left at the expense of the then mayor, David Davies. The tower was designed by a local architect, Richard Thomas, built by a local builder, John Evans, and completed in August 1892. A public library was officially opened in the former corn exchange on the ground floor of the building on 6 February 1950. The building continued to serve as the meeting place of the Cardigan Borough Council for much of the rest of the 20th century but ceased to be the local seat of government when the enlarged

Ceredigion District Council Ceredigion District Council was one of six district-level authorities in the county of Dyfed, Wales, from 1974 until 1996. The district had an identical area to the pre-1974 administrative county of Cardiganshire. From its creation in 1974 the ...

was formed in 1974. After the public library relocated to the Canolfan Teifi in 1994, an art gallery was established on the ground floor of the building. A substantial programme of refurbishment works was carried out with financial support from the

Heritage Lottery Fund The National Lottery Heritage Fund, formerly the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF), distributes a share of National Lottery funding, supporting a wide range of heritage projects across the United Kingdom. History The fund's predecessor bodies were ...

by a not-for profit local regeneration company, Menter Aberteifi, at a cost of £2.5 million and completed in 2008.

References

{{reflist Cardigan, Ceredigion City and town halls in Wales Grade II* listed buildings in Ceredigion Government buildings completed in 1860

History

See also

References