County Buildings is a municipal facility at Martin Street in

Stafford Stafford () is a market town and the county town of Staffordshire, in the West Midlands region of England. It lies about north of Wolverhampton, south of Stoke-on-Trent and northwest of Birmingham. The town had a population of 70,145 in t ...

Staffordshire Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation Staffs.) is a landlocked county in the West Midlands region of England. It borders Cheshire to the northwest, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, Warwickshire to the southeast, the West Midlands Cou ...

. The building, which is the meeting place for

Staffordshire County Council Staffordshire County Council is the top-tier local authority for the non-metropolitan county of Staffordshire Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation Staffs.) is a landlocked county in the West Midlands region of England. It borders Cheshir ...

, 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

In the 19th century the Shire Hall in Market Square became well established as the venue for judicial meetings and civic functions in the county. Following the implementation of the

Local Government Act 1888 Local may refer to: Geography and transportation * Local (train), a train serving local traffic demand * Local, Missouri, a community in the United States * Local government, a form of public administration, usually the lowest tier of administrat ...

, which established county councils in every county, there was a need to find offices and a meeting place for

. Council leaders decided to procure new county offices: the site they selected in Martin Street had previously been occupied by several a row of retail properties. The new County Buildings, which were designed by

Henry Hare Henry Thomas Hare (1860–1921) was an English architect who was born in Scarborough, North Yorkshire, Scarborough, Yorkshire and educated in Sheffield and Harrogate. Career At the age of 16 he was articled to the Scarborough architect C A Bur ...

in the Baroque revival style, were completed in 1895. The design involved an asymmetrical main frontage with fifteen bays facing onto the Martin Street; the central section of seven bays featured a doorway with an

architrave In classical architecture, an architrave (; from it, architrave "chief beam", also called an epistyle; from Greek ἐπίστυλον ''epistylon'' "door frame") is the lintel or beam that rests on the capitals of columns. The term can ...

and segmental

pediment Pediments are gables, usually of a triangular shape. Pediments are placed above the horizontal structure of the lintel, or entablature, if supported by columns. Pediments can contain an overdoor and are usually topped by hood moulds. A pedimen ...

with

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 windows on the first floor. The left hand section, which slightly projected forward, featured a window split by

Ionic order The Ionic order is one of the three canonic orders of classical architecture, the other two being the Doric and the Corinthian. There are two lesser orders: the Tuscan (a plainer Doric), and the rich variant of Corinthian called the composite or ...

columns while the right hand section, which also slightly projected forward, featured a

venetian window A Venetian window (also known as a Serlian window) is a large tripartite window which is a key element in Palladian architecture. Although Sebastiano Serlio (1475–1554) did not invent it, the window features largely in the work of the Italian a ...

. Internally, the principal room was the council chamber which featured plasterwork by Frederick Schenck as well as figures sculpted by William Aumonier. In April 2009 the council announced plans for a new headquarters in Tipping Street: the new offices were designed by 3DReid, built by Volker Fitzpatrick at a cost of £38 million and completed in October 2011. The new offices were officially opened by the

Countess of Wessex Earl of Wessex is a title that has been created twice in British history – once in the pre-Conquest Anglo-Saxon nobility of England, and once in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. In the 6th century AD the region of Wessex (the lands of the W ...

as "Staffordshire Place" in May 2013. Following the departure of council officers and their departments to Staffordshire Place, much of the office space in County Buildings was converted into a series of private residences known as "Martin Street Mansions". However, the county council retained the main civic rooms and continued to hold full meetings of the county council in the council chamber. The civic rooms in County Buildings were also made available for weddings and civil partnerships.

References

{{reflist S Grade II* listed buildings in Staffordshire Government buildings completed in 1895

History

See also

References