Then and Now: A now-vanished view of Newcastle’s Bigg Market in 1970 - and the scene today

This now-vanished view of Newcastle’s Bigg Market is one that was familiar to Geordies for more than 100 years.

Central to the scene was the old Town Hall, its presence partly blotting out the view of St Nicholas’ Cathedral (or Newcastle Cathedral as it’s branded today). Completed in 1858, on the former site of ‘unsightly’ medieval dwellings, the Town Hall was home to Newcastle’s council chamber from the mid-19th century until the opening of the new Civic Centre in the late 1960s.

Our photograph, published courtesy of Newcastle Libraries, was one of many taken by Laszlo Torday which capture bustling Newcastle in the late 1960s and early '70s.

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This scene could have been very different. At the time of the Town Hall’s construction, plans had been mooted by renowned Newcastle builder Richard Grainger to redevelop the frontages of the Cloth and Groat Markets and leave the area between them as an open space, providing a panoramic north-to-south view. The council rejected his proposal by 32 votes to 17, and the Town Hall was duly built, becoming one of Newcastle's most unloved buildings.

Constructed to a design by John Johnstone and William Alexander Knowles, the new Town Hall was one of the first in the country to make free use of classical and Renaissance features, breaking with academic styles. The southern view of the building, from St Nicholas’ Square, was perhaps more pleasing on the eye than the northern view, from the Bigg Market, which saw it taper to a narrow frontage.

The ground floor was devoted to shops, banking offices and a hotel. The council chamber was on the first floor, facing the cathedral. One floor of the building became home to a music hall which could accommodate up to 2,400 people.

The Town Hall, however, attracted plenty of negativity. The Roman Wall scholar Dr Collingwood Bruce described it as “a huge pile of buildings of modern erection which greatly impedes the traffic of the street and almost totally obscures the view of St Nicholas’”.

Another critic complained: “Looked at from the Bigg Market, the entire pile has a most mean and beggarly appearance. A tower has been erected which suggests the idea of a pigeon ducket.”

Over time, the building fell into disrepair, and its tower was removed in 1930. A report from November 1965 declared: “Newcastle’s old Town Hall is a monstrosity to begin with, but now derelict, dilapidated and filthy, it’s a nightmare.” Around that time, it even became home to a winter zoo which housed lions, tigers, monkeys, exotic birds and snakes.

In 1973, a few years after Laszlo Torday’s photograph was taken, the Town Hall was razed to the ground, and for a short while the view down the Bigg Market towards the cathedral was unimpeded,echoing Grainger’s earlier vision. That empty space was soon filled with the period-design office, shop and leisure complex, One Cathedral Square, which stands to this day.