The Old Town Hall is a municipal building in the Market Place in

Somerton, Somerset Somerton ( ) is a town and civil parish in the English county of Somerset. It gave its name to the county and was briefly, around the start of the 14th century, the county town, and around 900 was possibly the capital of Wessex. It has held a w ...

, England. The building, which is used as an arts centre, 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 originally commissioned as a shambles, i.e. a meat market, and the site chosen for it was to just to the south of the Butter Cross which itself was rebuilt in 1673. The lord of the manor at the time was

Sir Stephen Fox Sir Stephen Fox (27 March 1627 – 28 October 1716) of Farley, Wiltshire, Farley in Wiltshire, of Redlynch, Somerset, Redlynch Park in Somerset, of Chiswick, Middlesex and of Whitehall, was a royal administrator and courtier to King Charles ...

of Redlynch Park, courtier to King Charles II, and the "richest commoner in the

three kingdoms The Three Kingdoms of Cao Wei, Shu Han, and Eastern Wu dominated China from AD 220 to 280 following the end of the Han dynasty. This period was preceded by the Eastern Han dynasty and followed by the Jin dynasty (266–420), Western Jin dyna ...

". The shambles was designed in the

neoclassical style Neoclassicism, also spelled Neo-classicism, emerged as a Western cultural movement in the decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music, and architecture that drew inspiration from the art and culture of classical antiquity. Neoclassici ...

, 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 ...

with

hamstone Hamstone is a honey-coloured building stone from Ham Hill, Somerset, England. It is a well-cemented medium to coarse grained limestone characterised by marked bedding planes of clay inclusions and less well-cemented material which weather dif ...

dressings and formed part of a trio of new buildings, including a tolsey house (i.e. a building for administering market tolls) and a storage shed (used for storing sheep hurdles), which were provided for the use of local merchants under a lease of markets and fairs, in 1688. The design involved a rectangular two-storey building; the west end featured a gabled porch on the ground floor and an arched five-light

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 and transomed on the first floor, while the east end was fenestrated by a full-height semi-circular five-light mullioned and transomed window. 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 ...

commented that, while most of the building appears to date from the 17th century, the detailing of the large window at the east end indicates a date, for that window at least, "of circa 1700 or perhaps even later". The north elevation featured, in the left hand section, a five-light mullioned and transomed widow and, in the right hand section, a pair of two-light mullioned windows on the ground floor and a single five-light mullioned window on the first floor. The southern elevation featured, on the ground floor, a four-light mullioned window in the left hand section and two arched openings in the right hand section and, on the first floor, a row of four three-light mullioned windows. Internally, the principal rooms were the market hall on the ground floor and the assembly room on the first floor. The gabled porch at the west end was originally used a lock-up for petty criminals. The building was repaired in 1719, and again, in 1799. The assembly room on the first floor was used for public events such as the annual meeting of the Mid-Somerset

Labourer's Friend Society The Labourer's Friend Society was a society founded by Lord Shaftesbury in the United Kingdom in 1830 for the improvement of working class conditions. This included the promotion of allotment of land to labourers for "cottage husbandry" that late ...

, chaired by the local member of parliament, Sir Alexander Hood, in October 1850. It was also used for

magistrates' court A magistrates' court is a lower court where, in several Jurisdiction (area), jurisdictions, all criminal proceedings start. Also some civil matters may be dealt with here, such as family proceedings. Courts * Magistrates' court (England and Wales) ...

hearings until 1870. Ownership of the building was passed down various generations of the Fox family until Giles Fox-Strangways, 6th Earl of Ilchester sold it to the parish council in 1913. For much of the 20th century the ground floor accommodated a billiards room and was used as a community events venue known as the "Somerton Club" while the assembly room was used as a furniture store. The building was acquired by a developer and the whole structure was converted for office use in 1982. It was then re-configured again for use as an art gallery and shop managed by Art Care Education (operating as ACE Arts), which was established as a charity in May 2016.

References

{{reflist City and town halls in Somerset Grade II listed buildings in Somerset Somerton, Somerset