First Hall
Clothworkers' Hall stands partly on a site granted between 1170 and 1197 by Prior Stephen of Holy Trinity Priory, Aldgate to Alfred the tiler, or roofer. The property later belonged to the de Grey family, by whom it was conveyed to a group of individually-named shearmen in 1456.
A Hall must have existed, or been built on the site, of which no physical description survives. When the Company of Shearmen merged with the Fullers' Company to form The Clothworkers' Company, this building became the Clothworkers' first Hall.
Little is known of the appearance of this earliest Hall, though a number of other Livery or Guild Halls survive elsewhere in Britain, to which comparisons may be made, for example those at Leicester and York.
An inventory of the items owned by the Shearmen and passed on to the new Company survives, which tells us something of the Hall's contents and arrangements.
The main Hall was evidently arranged with a dais at one end. The dais had a long painted table and two further tables ran down either side of the Hall. Seating took the form of long benches. The Hall also contained a hanging and a beam for five candlesticks.
Other rooms included an upper chamber, containing a long trestle table, two benches and a chest; a parlour, containing a trestle table and a hanging trimmed with red cloth, and a kitchen.
Second Hall
In 1548-9 a new Hall was erected by Henry Davyson, bricklayer and John Sampson, carpenter.
A plan in the Company's archives shows this building as it appeared in 1612. Substantial work had been done on the Parlour in 1594 and it may have been extended in this year.
The plan shows that the layout was typical for its date, including the Hall approached across a courtyard and entered from a screens passage. At one end was a dais, with oriel windows on either side. Some idea of the appearance of this arrangement may be gained from contemporary college halls at Oxford and Cambridge.
We know from the survey that accompanies the plan that both Hall and Parlour stood on undercrofts. Above part of the parlour and sharing its oriel was the Ladies' Chamber. To the west of this lay the Dry Parlour, with its Plate Chamber and Counting House, an Armoury House over the Kitchen and the Pastry. There was also a Gallery and a further Counting House.
An inventory drawn up in 1555 suggests that, at least initially, many of the furnishings were reused from the former Hall, for many are described as old and some match the descriptions of pieces in the Shearmen's inventory.
The garden was clearly an important element of the Hall and was newly planted when the Hall was rebuilt. Lists of plants purchased suggest that it was a herb-garden in the form of a knot, planted to be sweet-smelling, with lavender, rosemary, thyme and hyssop, as well as a vine.
Third Hall
Very little is known of the third Hall, which was commenced in 1633. It was burned in the Great Fire of London, although the Fourth Hall seems to have been in part a re-facing of the old, damaged, structure.
Like the previous Hall, the third Hall was entered from Mincing Lane, after which the visitor crossed a courtyard to reach the Livery Hall, which was oriented North-South. The subsidiary rooms seem to reflect those in the previous Hall, with the addition of a Music Room and the 'Hippocras House', which had walls lined with shelves and contained a great press (cupboard) and a balloting box.
This was the Hall which Samuel Pepys recorded visiting on 28 June 1660: 'Our entertainment very good. A brave hall. Good company and very good Musique'.
Fourth Hall
The Fourth Hall as originally built seems to have been partly a refacing of the fire-damaged walls of the relatively-new third Hall. It was rebuilt quickly and was already in use by autumn 1667.
It was described in 1708 as 'a noble rich building' ornamented with fluted columns in brick with stone Corinthian capitals.
It was clearly remodelled over the years. In 1724-5 a new Court Room was erected leading off from the Hall, which is shown in a drawing in the Company Archives. The facade to Mincing Lane as shown in a print of 1812 appears as a relatively new building.
A watercolour of 1830 shows the facade of the Hall, with its stained glass windows just visible.
Nevertheless, the retention of older elements meant that by the 1850s, the Hall's arrangements were seen as inconvenient. It was deemed undignified to enter the Hall past the kitchens and the offices were held to be too far from the Court Room.
Fifth Hall
In 1855, Samuel Angell, the Company's surveyor, wrote a report on the state of Clothworkers' Hall. The structure was deemed unsound and incommodious and it was recommended that the whole be pulled down and rebuilt.
The Hall was demolished in 1856 and a new building erected according to Angell's designs. Like many contemporary buildings in the City, it was Italian Renaissance in style and The Times described it as 'one of the finest of which the City can boast'.
The main entrance remained on Mincing Lane, behind an imposing facade and the Livery Hall was on the first floor, still oriented North-South. However the building now took up most of the site and formed a single, though picturesque, block rather than being arranged around courtyards.
The wealth of the Company was reflected in the sumptuous interiors, with their ornate polychromed and gilded plasterwork and lavish use of polished granite and marble.
Sixth Hall
Plans to rebuild the Victorian Hall in the 1920s came to nothing but on 10th May 1941, the Company was left with no option after the Hall was completely demolished by enemy action.
The new Hall was begun by Henry Tanner, succeeded by Herbert Austen Hall who was the main designer. The foundation stone was laid on 17 July, 1956 by Princess Marina, Duchess of Kent and the Hall opened for business in 1958.
The structure was a metal frame, clad with brick and Portland Stone in the typical minimal Classicism of the 1950s. For the first time, the building was approached from Dunster Court and the Livery Hall lay East-West.
At first the rooms were rather stark and bare, enlivened by some antiques donated by members of the Company to replace the lost treasures. In 1985-6, the interiors were refurbished by Donald Insall and Associates, in styles evoking the history of English Classicism from the period of Wren to the present, using materials and techniques intended to represent the best of British craftsmanship.
Now, once again, The Clothworkers' Company can carry on its work and entertain its guests in rooms redolent with history but including every modern convenience.