Elie and Earlsferry Town Hall is a former municipal structure in High Street in

Elie and Earlsferry Elie and Earlsferry is a coastal town and former royal burgh in Fife, and parish, Scotland, situated within the East Neuk beside Chapel Ness on the north coast of the Firth of Forth, eight miles east of Leven. The burgh comprised the linked vi ...

, Scotland. The structure, which is currently used as an events venue, is Category B

listed Listed may refer to: * Listed, Bornholm, a fishing village on the Danish island of Bornholm * Listed (MMM program), a television show on MuchMoreMusic * Endangered species in biology * Listed building, in architecture, designation of a historicall ...

History

The first building on the site was an earlier town house which dated back to 1772. It was a two-story building with a steeple: it contained an assembly room for the burgh leaders on the first floor and a lock-up, which was partly below ground, for petty criminals. It also featured an external staircase, providing access to the assembly room on the first floor, but the staircase was demolished in 1849. By the mid-19th century the town house was old and decrepit and a new town council, elected in 1871, decided to demolish the old building and to replace it with a new structure on the same site. The foundation stone for the new, single-storey building was laid on 3 September 1872. It was designed by the locally-born architect, John Currie, in the

Scottish baronial style Scottish baronial or Scots baronial is an architectural style of 19th century Gothic Revival which revived the forms and ornaments of historical architecture of Scotland in the Late Middle Ages and the Early Modern Period. Reminiscent of Scot ...

, built in

rubble masonry 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. Analogously, some medieval cathedral walls are outer shells of ashlar with an inn ...

and was completed in March 1873. Parts of the old structure, including the steeple, were retained and incorporated into the new structure. The design involved an asymmetrical main frontage with four bays facing onto the High Street; the first three bays on the left were fenestrated by narrow round headed

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 ...

s surmounted by

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 a ...

s, while the right hand bay contained a round headed doorway surmounted by a date stone and a stepped gable. There was a small

bartizan A bartizan (an alteration of ''bratticing''), also called a guerite, ''garita'', or ''échauguette'', or spelled bartisan, is an overhanging, wall-mounted turret projecting from the walls of late medieval and early-modern fortifications from the ...

at the left hand corner of the building and, behind and to the right of the doorway was the old steeple, which featured clock faces and a belfry and which was surmounted by a

spire A spire is a tall, slender, pointed structure on top of a roof of a building or tower, especially at the summit of church steeples. A spire may have a square, circular, or polygonal plan, with a roughly conical or pyramidal shape. Spires are ...

. The bell in the belfry was cast at John C. Wilson's bell foundry in

Glasgow Glasgow ( ; sco, Glesca or ; gd, Glaschu ) is the most populous city in Scotland and the fourth-most populous city in the United Kingdom, as well as being the 27th largest city by population in Europe. In 2020, it had an estimated popul ...

in 1864. The building continued to serve as the meeting place of the burgh of Earlsferry until 1930, when it became the town hall of the enlarged burgh of Elie and Earlsferry. After the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, a plaque was presented by Polish parachute forces and placed on the front of the building: the plaque had been presented by members of the

Polish 1st Independent Parachute Brigade The 1st (Polish) Independent Parachute Brigade was a parachute infantry brigade of the Polish Armed Forces in the West under the command of Major General Stanisław Sosabowski, created in September 1941 during the Second World War and based in S ...

to reflect their gratitude at the hospitality they had received during their stay in the burgh during the war. Another plaque was installed, in June 1951, just on the left of the doorway, to commemorate the life of the locally-born

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping wi ...

er, James Braid, who won

the Open Championship The Open Championship, often referred to as The Open or the British Open, is the oldest golf tournament in the world, and one of the most prestigious. Founded in 1860, it was originally held annually at Prestwick Golf Club in Scotland. Later th ...

five times. The building ceased to be the local seat of government when the enlarged North-East Fife District Council was formed in 1975. However, the building continued to be used as a venue for local community events. In December 2020, a local community group made an offer to

Fife Council Fife Council is the local authority for the Fife area of Scotland and is the third largest Scottish council, with 75 elected council members. Councillors are generally elected every five years. At the 2012 election there were 78 councillors ele ...

to acquire ownership of the building. After securing a grant of £42,500 from the Scottish Land Fund, the community group completed the acquisition in 2021.

Architectural detail

The Town Clock, High Street (geograph 3749685).jpg, Clock tower, the lower section of which is a remnant of the former town house File:Crow-stepped gables (geograph 6341574).jpg, Gable

dormer A dormer is a roofed structure, often containing a window, that projects vertically beyond the plane of a pitched roof. A dormer window (also called ''dormer'') is a form of roof window. Dormers are commonly used to increase the usable space ...

s in the crow-stepped design Plaque gifted by Polish soldiers to town of Elie - geograph.org.uk - 1007618.jpg, A plaque on the building, gifted by Polish

paratroops A paratrooper is a military parachutist—someone trained to parachute into a military operation, and usually functioning as part of an airborne force. Military parachutists (troops) and parachutes were first used on a large scale during World ...

who were stationed in the town during the

Plaque on Earlsferry Town Hall (geograph 6342814).jpg, A plaque on the building commemorating the life of James Braid

References

External links

*{{official, https://www.earlsferrytownhall.org.uk Government buildings completed in 1873 1873 establishments in Scotland City chambers and town halls in Scotland Category B listed buildings in Fife 2021 mergers and acquisitions

History

Architectural detail

See also

References

External links