In the early 20th century the East Ham Urban District Council held its meetings in the local school board offices in Wakefield Street.[2] Following a rapid growth in the local population,[3] 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.[4]
Detail on the north face of the town hall
The foundation stone for the new building was laid in 1901.[5] It was designed by Henry Cheers and Joseph Smith in the Renaissance style, built by D.W. Barker and was officially opened by the philanthropist, John Passmore Edwards, on 5 February 1903.[6] The design involved an asymmetrical main frontage with six bays facing onto Barking Road; the right hand section featured a 150 foot (46 m) high tower and a large archway to the extreme right inscribed with the words "Public Hall" above.[1][7] The tower contained a clock by Smith & Sons of Derby,[8] and an hour bell cast by John Taylor &Co of Loughborough, which weighed almost a ton (19cwt).[9] 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.[3] Internally, the principal rooms were the public hall, the council chamber and the mayor's parlour.[1]
An additional building in Stratford, which was designed by the borough architect, Ken Lund, and Norman White in the shape of a ziggurat, 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.[13]
Offices at Newham Dockside
Most council officers and their departments were re-located to Newham Dockside (Building 1000 in Dockside Road) in 2010.[14] The building had been designed by Aukett Swanke and developed by Development Securities, Standard Life Investments and the London Development Agency as part of a scheme to regenerate the Royal Albert Dock; it had been built by Bowmer + Kirkland at a cost of £70 million and had been completed in June 2004.[15][16] 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.[17] However, formal meetings of the council continue to take place in the town hall.[18]
^Mercer, Vaudrey (1977). The Life and Letters of Edward John Dent, Chronometer Maker, and Some Account of His Successors. London: The Antiquarian Horological Society. p. 528.
^Deedes, Cecil; Walters, Henry Beauchamp (1909). The Church Bells of Essex Their Founders, Inscriptions, Traditions, and Uses. Aberdeen: W. Jolly & Sons. p. 142.
^"The Incorporation of East Ham". The Times. 15 September 1904. p. 6.
^"New London County Borough". The Times. 13 March 1914.
