The building was commissioned to replace an earlier town hall designed by
John Johnson in the
Italianate style which was located at the corner of High Road and Ruckholt Road and which had been completed in 1882. After the area became an
urban district in 1894, civic leaders decided that the old town hall was inadequate for their needs and decided to procure a larger building: they acquired some open land immediately to the north of the old building and converted the old building into a library. The new building, which was designed by John Johnson in an
enriched Italianate style, was built by F J Coxhead and completed in 1895. The design involved an asymmetrical main frontage with twelve bays facing onto High Road; the right-hand section of three bays featured a
portico with
Ionic order columns and
finial above on the ground floor; there were three stone-lined
niches flanked by
pilasters extending from the first floor up to the second floor with a single decorative gable above; a timber and lead spire was erected at roof level. A series of sculptures of gods and goddesses designed by John Lawlor were placed at the top of the pilasters on the side elevation of the building. The building was extended to the south west by a side wing, from the back of the technical institute down to Ruckholt Road, in 1910; this extension, designed in a
Baroque style, created additional offices on the ground floor and a council chamber on the first floor. The complex became the headquarters of the
Municipal Borough of Leyton when the area secured
municipal borough status in 1927. An opportunity for further expansion came in September 1938 when Leyton Technical Institute amalgamated with Walthamstow Technical Institute to form the new South West Essex Technical College at Forest Road in
Walthamstow: the council converted the area vacated by the technical institute to municipal use at that time. It was subsequently used as additional workspace by the council but, after being found surplus to requirements, it was sold to a developer, Lee Valley Estates, in 2006. The building benefited from an extensive programme of restoration works before re-opening as a business centre in 2010. == Current use - Leyton Municipal Offices (LMO) and Great Hall ==