[1] The building was commissioned to replace the Old Town Hall, located 1.7 miles (2.7 km) due south on Poplar High Street.

[1] Made of Portland stone panels, it commemorated the trades constructing the town hall and symbolised the borough's relationship with the River Thames and the youth of Poplar.

[8][9] The principal rooms were the council chamber, the mayor's parlour and an assembly hall which benefited from a sprung Canadian maple dance floor.

[11] The building was proclaimed by the council to be the first town hall to be erected in the modernist style[4] but ceased to function as the local seat of government when the enlarged London Borough of Tower Hamlets was formed in 1965.

[12] After being used as workspace by the council until the mid-1980s, the town hall was sold in the 1990s to a developer who added a roof extension and converted it for commercial use.