Newham Town Hall, formerly East Ham Town Hall, is a municipal building in Barking Road,
East Ham
East Ham is a district of the London Borough of Newham, England, 8 miles (12.8 km) east of Charing Cross. East Ham is identified in the London Plan as a Major Centre. The population is 76,186.
It was originally part of the Becontree Hun ...
, London. The town hall, which is the headquarters of
Newham London Borough Council
Newham London Borough Council is the local authority for the London Borough of Newham. It is a London borough council, one of 32 in the United Kingdom capital of London. The council is unusual in that its executive function is controlled by a di ...
, 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
![Newham Dockside building (geograph 4037925)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0e/Newham_Dockside_building_%28geograph_4037925%29.jpg)
In the early 20th century the East Ham Urban District Council held its meetings in the local school board offices in Wakefield Street. Following a rapid growth in the local population,
civic leaders decided to procure purpose-built council offices: the site chosen for the new building was a plot of open land on the corner of Barking Road and High Street South.
The foundation stone for the new building was laid in 1901. It was designed by Henry Cheers and Joseph Smith in the
Renaissance style
Renaissance architecture is the European architecture of the period between the early 15th and early 16th centuries in different regions, demonstrating a conscious revival and development of certain elements of Ancient Greece, ancient Greek and ...
, built by D.W. Barker and was officially opened by the philanthropist,
John Passmore Edwards
John Passmore Edwards M.P. (24 March 1823 – 22 April 1911) ODNB article by A. J. A. Morris, 'Edwards, John Passmore (1823–1911)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Sept 2004; online edn, May 200 accessed 15 ...
, on 5 February 1903. The design involved an asymmetrical main frontage with six bays facing onto Barking Road; the right hand section featured a high tower and a large archway to the extreme right inscribed with the words "Public Hall" above.
[ A long extension to the south of the main building was completed in 1910 and a three-storey annex was built to the east on Barking Road in 1939.][ Internally, the principal rooms were the public hall, the council chamber and the mayor's parlour.][
]
It was built to serve as the administrative headquarters of East Ham Urban District Council
East Ham was a local government district in the far south west of Essex from 1878 to 1965. It extended from Wanstead Flats in the north to the River Thames in the south and from Green Street in the west to Barking Creek in the east. It was part o ...
. The East Ham Urban District
East or Orient is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sun rises on the Earth.
Etymology
As in other languages, the word is formed from the f ...
was given municipal borough
Municipal boroughs were a type of local government district which existed in England and Wales between 1835 and 1974, in Northern Ireland from 1840 to 1973 and in the Republic of Ireland from 1840 to 2002. Broadly similar structures existed in S ...
status in 1904; and county borough
County borough is a term introduced in 1889 in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, to refer to a borough or a city independent of county council control, similar to the unitary authorities created since the 1990s. An equivalent ter ...
status in 1915. The building continues to be the local seat of government after the formation of the London Borough of Newham
The London Borough of Newham is a London borough created in 1965 by the London Government Act 1963. It covers an area previously administered by the Essex county boroughs of West Ham and East Ham, authorities that were both abolished by the s ...
in 1965, serving as its administrative headquarters.
An additional building in Stratford, which was designed by the borough architect, Ken Lund, and Norman White in the shape of a ziggurat
A ziggurat (; Cuneiform: 𒅆𒂍𒉪, Akkadian: ', D-stem of ' 'to protrude, to build high', cognate with other Semitic languages like Hebrew ''zaqar'' (זָקַר) 'protrude') is a type of massive structure built in ancient Mesopotamia. It has ...
, was completed in May 1976; it was to have been joined by another, larger ziggurat, but after reductions in funding and criticism of the design the original ziggurat was demolished in February 1998.
Most council officers and their departments were re-located to Newham Dockside (Building 1000 in Dockside Road) in 2010. The building had been designed by Aukett Swanke
Aukett Swanke is a firm of architects based in London.
History
The firm was founded as an architectural and interior design partnership by Michael Aukett in 1972. It acquired Fitzroy Robinson & Partners
Fitzroy Robinson & Partners was one of th ...
and developed by Development Securities, Standard Life Investments and the London Development Agency
The London Development Agency (LDA) was from July 2000 until 2012 the regional development agency for the London region in England. A functional body of the Greater London Authority, its purpose was to drive sustainable economic growth within ...
as part of a scheme to regenerate the Royal Albert Dock; it had been built by Bowmer + Kirkland
Bowmer + Kirkland Group is a British construction services business based in Heage, Derbyshire.
History
The company was established in 1923 as a partnership between joiner Alfred Bowmer and bricklayer Robert William Kirkland.
In July 2009 the f ...
at a cost of £70 million and had been completed in June 2004. After the developers had been unable to secure tenants, Newham Council acquired the building for £92 million and initiated a programme of fit-out works at a further cost of £19 million. However, formal meetings of the council continue to take place in the town hall.
References
{{reflist
Grade II* listed buildings in the London Borough of Newham
City and town halls in London
Government buildings completed in 1903
Grade II* listed government buildings