Robert Nemeth Hove Town Hall Works

Hove Town Hall

Residents of Hove love to hate their Town Hall. Dark and fortress-like, it is certainly ugly and still suffering from the removal of many of its best bits. I am a fan though and am most concerned at council plans to chop it around.

Hove Town Hall

To set the scene, I campaigned hard back in 2012 to persuade the council to sell their King’s House headquarters on the Hove seafront. The principal reason was that I felt that such a valuable site should be put to residential use. Also, a sale would force the council to consolidate office space (perhaps at what was an empty Co-op on London Road) and raise valuable funds that could go towards a new Black Rock or King Alfred. After a fight, the council agreed to sell – so far, so good.

It is estimated that £9 million could be generated from the sale of King’s House. If other offices were sold, and staff relocated, new premises could be found in a less valuable, more accessible, spot such as Preston Road. A huge surplus could then be put towards leisure facilities or something else equally vital. The value of public assets would increase. 

“Dark and fortress-like, it is certainly ugly”

Instead, the council is proposing a £16 million refurbishment of Hove Town Hall and has actually turned down a proposal for a much-needed new primary school at the rear of King’s House from Cllr Andrew Wealls. 

Although Hove Town Hall is ugly, it is a building of architectural integrity. Such thought was put into all manner of details by its architect, John Wells-Thorpe. After a fire tragically destroyed the original building in 1966, a group of dignitaries was flown to Holland to see the best of what modern architecture had to offer. The influence of Hilversum’s town hall of 1934, designed by Willem Marinus Dudok, is clear.
 
I adore Hove Town Hall’s Derbyshire spar concrete and its bronzed Spectrafloat glass, and I particularly mourn the loss of the tropical garden that once graced the entrance foyer. Also destroyed was an ‘undercroft’ on the Church Road side and a Japanese courtyard garden in the middle. Never built was a tower above the main entrance.
 
Hove Town Hall should be modified. Shops should go on the ground floor and its original tower could be added. But blowing £16 million of public money without consolidating other assets on an incredibly-damaging yet minor upgrade really is bad business.

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robert@buildingopinions.com
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Comments

  1. John Kapp says:

    Well done, Robert, I agree. I was on Hove Council in 1995 when we combined with Brighton in a unitary authority in 1996 and bought Kings House as our main office. With present austerity I guess that the council needs about half as much office space, so it was right to sell Kings house. However, the expenditure of £16 million on Hove town hall seems excessive.
    Last month (May) the Council and the NHS signed a historic agreement to pool the budgets of health, social care, housing and education into a pot of around £1bn pa, which promises integrated services (rather than in silos as at present. All these offices should be located close to each other. The CCG should move from Lanchester house to Hove town hall.

  2. JeanGoatcher says:

    As reident of Hove for 😯 years also counciltax payer I think it is essential that the main Community Hall should remain for use of residents. We DO NOT need shops but we do need a large space for gcommunity gatherings, concerts, meetings etc., We pay towards upkeep therefore we should be able to use the same for various activities etc., I sm interested in any group that is in favour of retaining the main Hall.i

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