County Sessions House, Liverpool

The County Sessions House is in Liverpool’s city centre. It is located to the east of the Walker Art Gallery, and close to the city’s famous World Museum. A Grade II listed building which, like many in the city, is clad in ashlar stone and built in the neoclassical style, County Sessions House originally functioned as a county court house.

Built between 1882 and 1884 and designed by local architects Francis & George Holme, the building once contained three separate courtrooms, barristers’ chambers, legal offices, and cells for the accused. As a courthouse, the building was required to have four separate entrances, for judges, solicitors, prisoners and the public. The interior is ingeniously designed so that the paths of these four groups did not cross until they reached the courtroom.

County Sessions House has been described as a Venetian style building, and has a distinctive portico columned entrance at the front. The coat of arms above the entrance is that of Lancashire County Council, to which the city of Liverpool once belonged. Now owned by National Museums Liverpool, the building houses a lecture theatre and other research facilities relating to the organisation’s many art galleries.