The building was commissioned on the initiative of a group of local businessmen who formed a private company to raise the finance needed to erect a town hall.

[1] It was designed by Shaw and Weightman in the Italianate style, built by John Stanhope in brick at a cost of £2,400 and was officially opened on 15 September 1865.

[1][3] The design involved a symmetrical main frontage with five bays facing onto Weeland Road; the central bay, which slightly projected forward, featured a wide arched doorway with wrought iron gates flanked by Doric order pilasters on the ground floor, a French door with a wrought iron balcony on the first floor and, above that, a tower which was surmounted by a modillioned cornice and, originally, by a pyramid-shaped roof.

[7] After the company which owned the building got into financial difficulty, the proprietor of the Aire Tar Works, George Limnell Lyon, acquired the building at auction and presented it to the new council at a nominal cost in 1902 and, following the closure of the mechanics' institute, the ground floor rooms were converted for use as a council chamber in 1904.

[9] The management of the town hall and the raising of income from room hire became the responsibility of a committee of volunteers in February 1976 and a clock was installed on the face of the tower in spring 1994.