Falkland Town Hall

Falkland Town Hall
Falkland Town Hall
Location	High Street, Falkland
Coordinates	56°15′12″N3°12′27″W / 56.2532°N 3.2074°W / 56.2532; -3.2074 Coordinates: 56°15′12″N3°12′27″W / 56.2532°N 3.2074°W / 56.2532; -3.2074
Built	1801
Architect	Thomas Barclay
Architectural style(s)	Neoclassical style
Listed Building – Category A
Official name	Falkland Town Hall, High Street
Designated	1 December 1971
Reference no.	LB31277
Shown in Fife

Falkland Town Hall is a municipal building in the High Street, Falkland, Fife, Scotland. The structure, which has been converted for use as offices and as shops, is a Category A listed building. ^[1]

History

The first municipal building in the town was an old tolbooth which dated back to the 17th century. By the late 18th century, it was in a dilapidated condition and the burgh leaders, who also had ambitions for a new school, decided to demolish the old tolbooth and to erect a new town hall, which would also accommodate the school, on the same site. ^[2] The new building was designed by Thomas Barclay of Balbirnie in the neoclassical style, built in ashlar stone and was completed in 1801. ^{[3] [4] [5]}

The design involved a symmetrical main frontage with three bays facing onto the High Street; the central bay, which slightly projected forward, featured a square headed doorway enclosed by a round headed arch with voussoirs; there was a tri-partite mullioned window on the first floor and a pediment with the burgh coat of arms in the tympanum above. The outer bays were fenestrated by round headed sash windows on the ground floor and square headed sash windows on the first floor, and there were balustrades under each of the first-floor windows. The eastern elevation, facing onto Back Wynd, was designed in a similar style but, in the outer bays, the first-floor windows were blind, and, above the central pediment, there was a square tower which was surmounted by an octagonal belfry, a spire and a weather vane. ^[6] Internally, the principal rooms were the classroom on the ground floor and the burgh council chamber on the first floor. ^[2] The council chamber contained some fine decorative plasterwork. ^[7] The bell, which had been cast by a Dutch foundryman, Michael Burgerhuys of Middelburg, in 1630 was recovered from the old tolbooth and a clock was designed and manufactured by James Ritchie & Son and installed in the tower in 1858. ^[2]

The town clerk, Charles Gulland, and other council officers relocated to Bank House, on the opposite side of Back Wynd, in around 1900. ^{[8] [9] [10]} The building continued to serve as the meeting place of the burgh council for much of the 20th century but ceased to be the local seat of government when the enlarged North-East Fife District Council was formed in 1975. ^{[11] [12]} The first floor of the building was subsequently converted for commercial use and the ground floor, after being used as a post office, was converted for use as a shop. ^[13]

In 2016, the town hall was used to depict the Inverness County Records Office when it appeared in the television series, Outlander. ^[14]

See also

• List of listed buildings in Falkland, Fife
• List of Category A listed buildings in Fife

References

1. Historic Environment Scotland. "Falkland Town Hall, High Street (LB31277)" . Retrieved 10 August 2022.
2. Historic Environment Scotland. "Falkland, High Street, Town Hall (29853)". Canmore . Retrieved 10 August 2022.
3. "Falkland Town Hall". Dictionary of Scottish Architects. Retrieved 10 August 2022.
4. Tolbooths and Town-houses Civic Architecture in Scotland to 1833. Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland. 1996. pp. 90–91. ISBN   978-0114957995.
5. Glendinning, Miles; MacInnes, Ranald; MacKechnie, Aonghus (1996). A History of Scottish Architecture From the Renaissance to the Present Day. Edinburgh University Press. p. 553. ISBN   978-0748607419.
6. Gifford, John (2003). Fife (Buildings of England Series). Yale University Press. p. 118. ISBN   978-0300096736.
7. Fenton, Alexander; Stell, Geoffrey; Shaw, John; Storrier, Susan (2000). Scottish Life and Society: Scotland's buildings. Tuckwell Press. p. 262. ISBN   978-1862321236. Good examples of decorative plasterwork can still be found in Stirling Tolbooth (1703-5), Falkland Town House (1800) and Kinghorn Town House (1829-30)
8. Historic Environment Scotland. "Bank of Scotland (formerly British Linen) and town clerk's office High Street and Back Wynd (including garden walls) (LB31276)" . Retrieved 10 August 2022.
9. Worrall's directory of the north-eastern counties of Scotland comprising the counties of Forfar, Fife, Kinross, Aberdeen, Banff, and Kincardine. John Worrall. 1877. p. 216.
10. "No. 17178". The Edinburgh Gazette . 11 May 1954. p. 238.
11. "Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973". Legislation.gov.uk. Retrieved 29 March 2021.
12. "Falkland Burgh". Vision of Britain. Retrieved 10 August 2022.
13. "New cafe and deli planned for Fife town". Fife Today. 13 March 2020. Retrieved 10 August 2022.
14. "Outlander at Falkland". National Trust for Scotland. Retrieved 10 August 2022.