The central section of three bays, which was slightly projected forward, featured a doorway flanked by a pair of Tuscan order columns supporting an entablature.

The then mayor, Samuel Horrocks, read the Riot Act and a detachment from the 72nd Regiment, Duke of Albany's Own Highlanders corralled the demonstrators in front of the Corn Exchange.

[2] The use of the building as a corn exchange declined significantly in the wake of the Great Depression of British Agriculture in the late 19th century.

[6] In this context, the then mayor, Edmund Birley, arranged for the building to be converted into a public hall capable of accommodating 3,300 people, to a design by Benjamin Sykes, in 1882.

The local council intended to demolish it to make way for a proposed extension of the Ringway town centre bypass, whose construction a few years earlier had resulted in the creation of a gyratory system around the hall.

[1] A commemorative sculpture designed by Gordon Young, which was intended to depict the four cotton workers being shot, was unveiled in front of the building, on the 150th anniversary of the riot, in August 1992.