In the early 18th century, the local corn traders and farmers still conducted their trade in the open air at the rear of The Bell Hotel.

In the late 1830s, after finding this arrangement unsatisfactory, a group of local businessmen decided to form a company to finance and commission a purpose-built corn exchange for the town.

[1] The building was designed by Henry Francis Lockwood in the neoclassical style, built in ashlar stone at a cost of £2,000, and was completed on 1841.

[3] Following significant population growth, largely associated with the growing importance of Driffield as a market town, the area became an urban district in 1894.

It also became the venue for the announcement of general election results for the Buckrose constituency; it was there that the Unionist candidate, Admiral Sir Guy Gaunt, was declared the local member of parliament in November 1922.