After significant population growth, partly associated with the area's status as a tourist destination but also associated with its development as a residential suburb of Dublin, the township of Clontarf appointed town commissioners in 1869.

[2] The new building was designed by William George Perrott in the Gothic Revival style, built by Robert Farquharson in red brick and was completed in 1896.

It was at such a meeting in the town hall, in January 1916, that the supreme council agreed a proposal from Seán Mac Diarmada that a rebellion should proceed "at the earliest date possible".

[10][11] On 16 April 1916, another republican, Paddy Daly, was questioned in the town hall on his proposal to destroy the Magazine Fort in the Phoenix Park: the Easter Rising went ahead a week later.

[14] After Michael McGinn's death, his wife, Catherine, became caretaker at the town hall and provided accommodation for republican leaders during the Irish War of Independence.