LUNCHTIME TALKS
Chaired by Geoffrey Catchpole unless stated

The Georgian Guildhall

Talk chaired by Guy Whitmarsh

Trevor Fawcett

Bath Historical Research Group,

12 February 2004

The old ‘Stuart’ Guildhall, built 1626-7, sat on top of an open-sided market hall in the middle of the High Street, Bath. An incongruous Classical extension was added in 1725, but the building had become increasingly decrepit by c.1760 when the Corporation decided to replace it on a site further east incorporating the butchers’ shambles.

A traditional design by Thomas Lightholer was chosen initially, but work soon stalled when property-owners demanded exorbitant compensation for clearing the ground. By 1775, however, two rival schemes were on offer, one by the influential Councillor T.W. Atwood; the other, quite different, by the architect John Palmer. Atwood's plan for a free-standing Guildhall fronting the High Street and surrounded by a large provisions market on three sides won out despite vociferous local opposition. On Atwood's sudden death it was executed by his talented protégé Thomas Baldwin.

The Building Committee minutes, plus Baldwin's extant drawings, supply much detail about its construction, fitting-up, and furnishing. In spring 1777 craftsmen were still busy when the Corporation moved in, leaving the old Guildhall to be demolished, thus freeing the High Street at last from a notorious traffic obstruction. It had been a costly effort, but the Corporation élite now had a Neo-classical showpiece that – especially in the sumptuous Banqueting Room – more than matched the gentry's exclusive Assembly Rooms built a few years earlier.

Trevor Fawcett