The Municipal Offices are located on Queen Victoria Road in

High Wycombe High Wycombe, often referred to as Wycombe ( ), is a market town in Buckinghamshire, England. Lying in the valley of the River Wye, Buckinghamshire, River Wye surrounded by the Chiltern Hills, it is west-northwest of Charing Cross in London, ...

Buckinghamshire Buckinghamshire (, abbreviated ''Bucks'') is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England and one of the home counties. It is bordered by Northamptonshire to the north, Bedfordshire to the north-east, Hertfordshir ...

, England. The structure is used as the High Wycombe local area office of

Buckinghamshire Council Buckinghamshire Council is the Local Government in England, local authority for the Buckinghamshire (district), Buckinghamshire district in England. It is a Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority, performing both county and district- ...

History

Since the town became a

municipal borough A municipal borough was a type of local government Local government is a generic term for the lowest tiers of governance or public administration within a particular sovereign state. Local governments typically constitute a subdivision of ...

, under the name of Chepping Wycombe, on 1 January 1836, the borough council had always held its meetings in the 18th century

guildhall A guildhall, also known as a guild hall or guild house, is a historical building originally used for tax collecting by municipalities or merchants in Europe, with many surviving today in Great Britain and the Low Countries. These buildings commo ...

in the High Street, whilst the council's staff were accommodated in various rented offices around the town. When the council decided to proceed with building its own municipal offices and council chamber in the early 1930s, it chose not to use the site north of

High Wycombe Town Hall High Wycombe Town Hall is a public building located on Queen Victoria Road in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, England. The building, which is used as an events venue, is a Grade II listed building. History The building was commissioned to replac ...

which had been reserved for that purpose in the 1903 design for that building. Instead, it built a separate building on the opposite side of Queen Victoria Road, facing the town hall. The new building was designed by Richard Greaves Brocklehurst and

Charles Cowles-Voysey Charles Cowles-Voysey (24 June 1889 – 10 April 1981) was an English architect. Career Charles Voysey studied at the Architectural Association School and the UCL Bartlett School of Architecture. Between 1909 and 1912 he was articled to Horac ...

in the neo-Georgian style. The foundation stone for the new building was laid on 16 May 1931 and it was officially opened on 21 June 1932, being given the name "Municipal Offices". The design involved a symmetrical main frontage with eleven bays facing onto Queen Victoria Road. The central section of five bays, which slightly projected forward, featured a doorway with an

architrave In classical architecture, an architrave (; , also called an epistyle; ) is the lintel or beam, typically made of wood or stone, that rests on the capitals of columns. The term can also apply to all sides, including the vertical members, ...

flanked by

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 windows, but can now contain an individual sheet (or sheets, in the case of double glazing) of glass. History ...

s on either side; there was a full-length

wrought iron Wrought iron is an iron alloy with a very low carbon content (less than 0.05%) in contrast to that of cast iron (2.1% to 4.5%), or 0.25 for low carbon "mild" steel. Wrought iron is manufactured by heating and melting high carbon cast iron in an ...

balcony together with five French doors with architraves on the first floor. The wing sections featured doorways with architraves in the central bays and there were sash windows with

keystones A keystone (or capstone) is the wedge-shaped stone at the apex of a masonry arch or typically round-shaped one at the apex of a vault. In both cases it is the final piece placed during construction and locks all the stones into position, allo ...

in the other bays on the ground floor and in the bays on the first floor. At roof level, each of the three sections had its own

hipped roof A hip roof, hip-roof or hipped roof, is a type of roof where all sides slope downward to the walls, usually with a fairly gentle slope, with variants including tented roofs and others. Thus, a hipped roof has no gables or other vertical sides ...

with the central roof advanced from the wing sections. Internally, the principal room was the council chamber. The architects were awarded a bronze medal by the

Royal Institute of British Architects The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) is a professional body for architects primarily in the United Kingdom, but also internationally, founded for the advancement of architecture under its royal charter granted in 1837, three suppl ...

for the design of the municipal offices. High Wycombe Borough Council was abolished in 1974 under the

Local Government Act 1972 The Local Government Act 1972 (c. 70) is an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that reformed local government in England and Wales on 1 April 1974. It was one of the most significant acts of Parliament to be passed by the Heath Gov ...

. The successor body,

Wycombe District Council Wycombe may refer to the following places: Australia *Wycombe, Queensland, a locality in the Maranoa Region *High Wycombe, Western Australia, a suburb of Perth United Kingdom *High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, England **Wycombe District, a local ...

, used the municipal offices as its headquarters, substantially extending the building to the rear and renaming it the "District Council Offices". Following further local government reorganisation in 2020, the building became the High Wycombe local area office of

References

{{reflist High Wycombe Government buildings completed in 1932 City and town halls in Buckinghamshire