The building is located on land once owned by Nathaniel Briggs Borden, an early Fall River businessman and politician who died in 1865.

The building was designed as a memorial to him by his widow Lydia and his three adult children, Simeon, Nathaniel, Jr. and Louisa Borden Aldrich.

Swasey, who had previously designed several notable buildings in Fall River, including the Central Congregational Church on Rock Street and Simeon's mansion on Highland Avenue.

Like these other structures, the Borden Block was also designed in the Ruskinian Gothic Revival style, featuring polychrome brick and carved stone details.

The theatre also hosted various drama and comedy stage acts from the time that it opened well into the early 20th century, the motion pictures began to be shown.

The Borden Block contained the city's first telephone exchange from 1879 to 1890, when it was relocated to its own building.