Walking a bit of our city’s history ……the Rates Hall

For countless thousands of Mancunians over the decades, the Rates Hall, in the Town Hall Extension was just where you went to pay your Council bills.

The Rate Hall, 1959

But I bet a fair few of them took time out to admire the design of the place.

I know I always did, although in my case it was not to settle a bill, just as a short cut from St Peter’s Square, to Mount Street.

It was that mix of wooden counters, period lamp shades and all that gold that I liked so much.

So here, for those who remember it, is a picture from 1959, while for the rest of you there is this photograph of the restored place from the camera of Daniel Hallen, taken in 2013.

The Rate Hall, 2013

The restoration was part of that bigger project to restore and refurbish both the Town Hall Extension and Central Ref during 2010-15 and included the creation of a public service hub, as well as somewhere to sit and admire the beauty of the building.

Picture; the Rates Hall, 1959, Courtesy of Manchester Archives+ Town Hall Photographers' Collection,
https://www.flickr.com/photos/manchesterarchiveplus/albums/72157684413651581?fbclid=IwAR35NR9v6lzJfkiSsHgHdQyL2CCuQUHuCuVr8xnd403q534MNgY5g1nAZfY and in 2017 from the collection of Andrew Simpson and the Hall in 2013, Daniel Hallen, licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.