The Assembly Rooms is a Grade I listed building completed in 1771 to designs of John Wood the Younger, and when built was the most significant civic building in Georgian Bath. The venue is devised as a sequence of high status rooms with tall ceilings and elaborately decorated interiors, creating spaces for society to dance, to gamble, to take tea, and to be seen.
The site hosted many varied uses following the decline in popularity of the Georgian Assembly, including as a concert venue and cinema, and a brief period when requisitioned for the construction of aeroplane componentry during war time. The site suffered catastrophic damage during the Bath Blitz of April 1942, following which the interiors were restored by Sir Albert Richardson.
Connolly Wellingham have been appointed by the National Trust to assist with design and conservation of this internationally significant showpiece in the Georgian city, ahead of the Trust’s resumption of management and operation of the site in 2023. The appointment was made following CWa’s invitation to join a selected shortlist of practices for the prestigious project. The project will assess the feasibility of revealing currently hidden layers of historic fabric throughout the Assembly Rooms, seek to tell a wider, immersive story of Bath’s society heyday, and ensure the building plays a renewed role within its contemporary city context.
The pre-application consultation dialogue was developed across 18 months, fostering a collaborative dialogue with key stakeholders Bath and North East Somerset Council, Historic England, the Bath Preservation Trust and the Georgian Group. Initial concept design work has been further informed by a suite of investigative opening-up works across summer 2023, including the excavation of the surviving 18thC cold bath in the basement vaults beneath the Ball Room. Planning and Listed Building Consent were submitted in December 2023.
Cover image - ‘Exterior view of the New Rooms’ - 1793