Corn Exchange And Town Hall

The Corn Exchange and Town Hall is a listed building in Swindon's Old Town with Tuscan pilasters, arched openings, and a square lantern sitting above its stone cornice. The ground floor now holds retail shops with modern windows where the original arches once stood.

The structure was built between 1852 and 1854 by architects Sampson Sage and E Robertson as part of Swindon's expanding town center. An extension as a grain exchange followed in 1866 to meet the town's growing trading needs.

The building shows how Swindon organized public life: it worked as a grain market, town hall, and business hub all at once, showing the range of functions a town building needed. Today's shops on the ground floor reveal how uses changed over time while the structure itself survived.

The building sits in the Old Town and is easy to find by following the main streets of the historic area. As an active retail location, it remains accessible during the day and offers a good view of the diverse architecture in the area.

The tower rises in four distinct tiers, each with its own architectural details: Ionic columns, chambers for clock mechanisms, and Venetian windows topped with Corinthian pilasters at the summit. This layered design makes the tower stand out from the simpler facade below.