Woodstock Town Hall

Woodstock Town Hall stands in the Market Place in Woodstock, on the site of the town's old market cross. Sir William Chambers designed it, and it was built in 1766 to 1767 at the expense of the Dukes of Marlborough, as a council hall raised over an open market hall. The arches were filled in in 1898. It is listed Grade II.

History

The Town Hall replaced a medieval guildhall that stood on the site of what is now 2 to 4 Market Street. In the seventeenth century that hall had two storeys, a small prison and an entrance porch, and by 1686 it housed the town's fire engine as well as the town clerk's office.

Plans that came to nothing

Woodstock tried for decades to replace it. Sir John Vanbrugh and Henry Joynes, then at work on Blenheim, discussed a new hall in 1713, and the Duke of Wharton promised £600 in about 1722, but nothing was built. The old hall was pulled down in 1757, and the council rented a parlour across the road for its meetings.

Chambers' hall

At last the Marlboroughs paid. The fourth Duke approved Chambers' plan in 1765, the market cross was cleared away, work began in March 1766, and the hall was in use by 1767. It cost over £1,100, in stone from Cornbury Park, Stonesfield slates and timber brought from London. The council chamber and hall were on the first floor; the arcaded ground floor was the market, with a lock-up at the east end and a fire-engine house on the south side. The fourth Duke's arms went up on the west front in 1768. Chambers also built New Bridge in Blenheim's park.

Later changes

After the Blenheim fire of 1861 the seventh Duke gave a drinking fountain for the south front. In 1898, for Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee, George Castle enclosed the ground floor to make a council chamber or mayor's parlour and a library, and the borough arms over the west door date from then. The engine house became a caretaker's office in 1934. When local government was reorganised in 1974 the town kept the hall as ancient property, and it is now the home of Woodstock Town Council and a venue for events and civil weddings.

What to look for

• The pedimented front, with the lion and unicorn in the pediment and a rusticated ground floor of three round arches, now blocked and fitted with sash windows.
• The borough arms of 1898 over the west door, and the Marlborough arms on the west front.
• The drinking fountain of 1861 on the south side.
• The marble sundial in a niche on the south wall, inscribed Tempus Fugit, the near twin of the dial on St Mary Magdalene.
• Inside, which you see only at events, the Doric columns of the old market hall on the ground floor, a seventeenth-century studded door and a seventeenth-century parish chest.

Visiting

The Town Hall is a working council building and events venue, so most visitors see it from the Market Place, which is level and open at all times. Inside is open for council business and booked events. The hall is licensed for civil marriages and partnerships for up to 60 people, in the Mayor's Parlour downstairs or the Assembly Room upstairs; Woodstock Town Council's website has details. A ramp from the Market Place and a stair lift to the upper floors give wheelchair access, the county council's register office says. The address is Town Hall, Market Place, Woodstock OX20 1SL.

Getting there

The Town Hall is in the Market Place in the middle of the town. There is no parking at the hall; park in the town and walk. Stagecoach's S3 runs from Oxford to Woodstock about every hour through the day.

The Woodstock town walk passes the hall on its way round the town's old streets.

Nearby

Our story on the two sundials of Woodstock pairs the hall's dial with the church's, on Park Street a few steps away. The Oxfordshire Museum is a few steps away too, and Blenheim's park holds the Column of Victory and Queen Pool. The Market Place has the Feathers, the Woodstock Arms, the Bear, the King's Arms and the Crown within a minute's walk.