Livery Hall virtual tours
Three of the City’s Livery Halls offer an online virtual ’tour’ of their respective hall. While the tours aren’t guided, they do provide the opportunity to browse around the halls at leisure:
The Worshipful Company of Saddlers is one of the very oldest of the City of London Livery companies. The earliest surviving records of a Guild of Saddlers in London date from circa 1160 AD, although the Guild could well pre-date that. Destroyed by the Great Fire of London and then bombed during the Blitz, the original Saddlers’ Hall dates back to the 14th Century and has been rebuilt several times.
Stationers’ Hall is a Grade I listed building, close to St Paul’s Cathedral. It is one of the few ancient Livery Halls remaining in the City of London. Completed in 1673 after the Great Fire of London, the Hall’s suite of magnificent, inter-linking rooms as well as the secluded garden makes it one of the most sought after venues in the City for Corporate events and Private functions.
The Hall is the third on this site, the Goldsmiths’ Company being located here since 1339. Little is known of the first Hall but the second was erected in 1634-6 and restored after the Great Fire of 1666. It lasted for almost two centuries, but was eventually demolished in the late 1820s. The present Hall, by Philip Hardwick, remains much as he designed it, although there have been changes to the decorative schemes and the use of rooms.
The Hall narrowly escaped complete destruction when in 1941 a bomb exploded inside the south-west corner. Faithfully restored on the exterior after the War and internally modified, it retains much of the charm of an urban palazzo. A major refurbishment which was completed in 1990 has further adapted this great building for the 21st century.
Back to Public Events