The building contains offices and grand ceremonial rooms such as the Great Hall which is decorated with Ford Madox Brown's imposing Manchester Murals illustrating the history of the city.

The building was designed with a screen of Ionic columns across a recessed centre, in a classicising manner strongly influenced by John Soane.

[6] As the size and wealth of the city grew, largely as a result of the textile industry, its administration outstripped the existing facilities, and a new building was proposed.

[8] The choice of location was influenced by a desire to provide a central, accessible, but relatively quiet site in a respectable district, close to Manchester's banks and municipal offices, next to a large open area, suitable for the display of a fine building.

On this tight site, the corporation built a grand hall, a suite of reception rooms, quarters for the lord mayor, offices and a council chamber.

[1] The second stage of a competition to design the town hall which attracted 137 entries was judged by Thomas Leverton Donaldson, a classicist, and gothicist George Edmund Street.

[4] When Queen Victoria refused to attend, Manchester Town Hall was opened on 13 September 1877 by the mayor, Abel Heywood, who had championed the project.

Charles Herbert Reilly, a contemporary architecture critic, thought the extension was 'dull' and 'drab'[17] while Nikolaus Pevsner considered it was Harris's best work.

[19] In a 2014 report, Manchester City Council highlighted the need to replace the building's heating and electrical systems, refurbish windows and high-level stonework and repair parts of the roofing.

Gothic features most prominent in the Manchester Town Hall are low rib vault ceilings and tall arched windows.

The choice of the Gothic was influenced by the wish for a spiritual acknowledgement of Manchester's late medieval heritage in the textile trade of the Hanseatic league and an affirmation of modernity in the fashionable neo-Gothic style favoured over the Neoclassical architecture of Liverpool.

[24] The architectural competition entries were judged in part on their suitability for the "climate of the district", and sample stone types were investigated.

Public corridors were faced with terracotta rather than plaster, and extensive use was made of stone vaulted ceilings, tiled dados and washable mosaic floors.

The decision to spend large amounts of money on a building "when most of its architectural effect would be lost because ruined by soot and made nearly invisible by smoke" was criticised.

[33] Waterhouse avoided using a polychrome scheme as seen in High Victorian Gothic buildings such as St Pancras railway station believing it to be impractical as Manchester's industrial atmosphere would quickly ruin the effect and decided a uniform stone exterior was the better solution.

[43] Waterhouse's plan for the town hall bridged the gap between office and ceremonial requirements and maximised space on its triangular site.

It has a wagon roof,[54] its ceiling divided into panels bearing the arms of countries and towns with which Manchester traded at the zenith of its mercantile power.

[59] F. A. Bruton wrote that "The Town Hall ... is best viewed when the Square is empty and silent, as, for example, on Saturday afternoon or Sunday, and it is then that we may realise what a splendid "ruin" it will make, to excite the wonder of the South Sea Islander of the future".

[60] James Stevens Curl described it as "a High-Victorian Gothic secular masterpiece that combines eclectic elements to form a style that can only be Victorian".

The original version of the political thriller House of Cards[68] (1990) and the 2003 BBC drama series State of Play[69] both used the town hall to represent Westminster.

The films Ali G Indahouse (2001), Sherlock Holmes (2008),[70] The Iron Lady (2011),[71] Victor Frankenstein (2014), and A Very English Scandal (2018) also all used the town hall as a stand-in for the interiors of the Palace of Westminster.

Chief Superintendent Nick Adderley described the location as "perfectly placed in the hub of the city" and suitable to "serve the needs of the public 24 hours a day".