The Old Town Hall is a former municipal building in the Mall in

Ealing Ealing () is a district in west London (sub-region), west London, England, west of Charing Cross in the London Borough of Ealing. It is the administrative centre of the borough and is identified as a major metropolitan centre in the London Pl ...

, London. The building, which is currently used as a branch of

National Westminster Bank National Westminster Bank, trading as NatWest, is a major retail and commercial bank in the United Kingdom based in London, England. It was established in 1968 by the merger of National Provincial Bank and Westminster Bank. In 2000, it becam ...

, is a Grade II

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

History

The building was commissioned by the Ealing Local Board which was established in 1863. The site the board selected, which was on the north side of The Mall, was just south of Ealing Station on the

District Railway The Metropolitan District Railway, also known as the District Railway, was a passenger railway that served London, England, from 1868 to 1933. Established in 1864 to complete an " inner circle" of lines connecting railway termini in London, the ...

. The building was designed by the town surveyor, Charles Jones, in the

Gothic Revival style Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic or neo-Gothic) is an architectural movement that after a gradual build-up beginning in the second half of the 17th century became a widespread movement in the first half of the 19th century ...

, built in

rubble masonry Rubble masonry or 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. Some medieval cathedral walls have outer shells of ashlar wi ...

and was completed in 1874. The design involved an asymmetric main frontage of six bays facing onto The Mall. The first bay on the left, which was slightly projected forward, featured a

bay window A bay window is a window space projecting outward from the main walls of a building and forming a bay in a room. A bow window is a form of bay with a curve rather than angular facets; an oriel window is a bay window that does not touch the g ...

on the ground floor, a tri-partite

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 sup ...

ed window on the first floor and a gable above. The third bay also contained a bay window on the ground floor. The fifth bay, which was also slightly projected forward, featured a three-stage tower; there was an arched doorway flanked by colonettes supporting an

archivolt An archivolt (or voussure) is an ornamental Molding (decorative), moulding or band following the curve on the underside of an arch. It is composed of bands of ornamental mouldings (or other architectural elements) surrounding an arched opening, ...

in the first stage, an arched window containing a

quatrefoil A quatrefoil (anciently caterfoil) is a decorative element consisting of a symmetrical shape which forms the overall outline of four partially overlapping circles of the same diameter. It is found in art, architecture, heraldry and traditional ...

in the second stage and a

lancet window A lancet window is a tall, narrow window with a sharp pointed arch at its top. This arch may or may not be a steep lancet arch (in which the compass centres for drawing the arch fall outside the opening). It acquired the "lancet" name from its rese ...

in the third stage, all surmounted by a

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

with

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

s and brattishing. The right-hand bay contained a doorway surmounted by a panel inscribed with the word "Offices" and by another quatrefoil. The other bays were fenestrated by arched windows on the ground floor and 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 the first floor. Internally, the principal room was the board room, which was located behind the bay windows on the ground floor. The architectural historian,

Nikolaus Pevsner Sir Nikolaus Bernhard Leon Pevsner (30 January 1902 – 18 August 1983) was a German-British art historian and architectural historian best known for his monumental 46-volume series of county-by-county guides, ''The Buildings of England'' (195 ...

, liked the design and referred to it as "more daring than most suburban municipal buildings of this date". However, with a decade, the building was considered too small for municipal use and a new town hall, also designed by Charles Jones, was completed on New Broadway in 1888. The local board decided to dispose of the old town hall which was converted for use as a bank. It became the local branch of London and County Bank in 1889. It was then rebranded as London County and Westminster Bank in 1909,

Westminster Bank Westminster Bank was a British retail bank which operated in England and Wales. It was created in 1834 as the London and Westminster Bank. It merged with the London and County Bank in 1909, after which it renamed itself the London County and W ...

in 1923 and

in 1970.

References

{{reflist Grade II listed buildings in the London Borough of Ealing City and town halls in London Government buildings completed in 1874 Grade II listed government buildings