Wigan Mining and Technical College, Library Street, Wigan (now Wigan Town Hall)

The old building in Library Street is much better. It is of 1901-3, high and gabled, of red brick and red terra cotta with Edwardian motifs such as the alternatively blocked columns. [Pevsner: South Lancashire. Page 426]

The foundation stone was laid in 1900 and the Countess of Crawford opened the building in 1903 to provide a new home for the rapidly expanding Wigan Mining and Technical College. The college had developed out of the Wigan Mechanics Institute, formed in the 1850s, and by the turn of the century was regarded as one of the country's foremost centres for training mining engineers. A later extension was added in 1929, but as the region's pits dwindled, the demand for mining engineers gradually reduced, and other departments of the expanding technical college, notably art and building, moved in. Following further expansion of the College in 1950-4, the building became an annex. By the end of the 1980s, Wigan College of Technology was growing rapidly and needed larger premises. At the same time the Council was looking for more space; unlike many town halls in the North-west, Wigan's former town hall in King Street, built in 1866, was neither the authority's administrative headquarters nor a particularly impressive building. Its ramshackle corridors provided increasingly unsuitable accommodation for both the Council's civic functions and the staff who worked there. Conversion of the building led to Wigan's 'new' town hall being opened in June of 1990. The building received the royal seal of approval, when the late Diana, Princess of Wales, performed the official opening in November 1991.

The former Mining School's Assembly Hall was converted into a Council Chamber, designed for the deliberations of the borough's 72 councillors. Especially noteworthy are its 22 original stained glass windows featuring quotations and proverbs with a moral message. The building's original educational motto, Lux ex Tenebris (light out of darkness), is still displayed above the main entrance and also, appropriately, in the Council Chamber.

The building contains two “Diamond” urinals in leadless glaze, designed by Walter E Mason of Horwich each of which is decorated with a small picture of a bee at the appropriate location. These are a more scholarly version of the Twyfords “Bullseye Target” urinal, the Latin for a bee being 'apis'! [Lucinda Lambton. Temples of Convenience Page 74-75]