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Thomas Henry Nowell Parr

Thomas Parr, 1895.
Thomas Parr, 1895.
Between 1896 and 1905 Nowell Parr designed five large buildings in Brentford in his distinctive style of red brick with terracotta decoration.

Three of these buildings survive today: the public baths, the fire station and the Carnegie library and these all feature in the Layton Trail.

The other two buildings, the Vestry Hall and the Brentford enclosed market, do not survive today.

Vestry Hall.
Vestry Hall.
The finest of the Nowell Parr buildings was the Vestry Hall in Half Acre which opened in 1900. It contained various offices and committee rooms, a soup kitchen and a large hall that was used for meetings and functions.

The County Court moved there in 1907. The building was capable of seating 600 people for sessions.

It was demolished in 1963 to make way for the Brentford Police Station. It is likely that today this building would be “listed” and protected from development and demolition.

The Brentford Enclosed Market was conceived in 1893 as a replacement for the chaotic and informal market along Kew Bridge Road and the open market site controlled by the local board facing Kew Bridge Road and between the railway line and London Stile Farm.

Brentford enclosed market, 1968.
Brentford enclosed market, 1968.
The new covered market was opened in 1906 on land purchased from the Gunnersbury Park estate in 1902. It extended the existing market with many stands and shop-fronts lining the main road. It even boasted a banana-ripening room.

It expanded rapidly but by the 1960s motorised vehicles were finding it difficult and in 1974 the market moved to the new Western International Market. The fountain from Kew Bridge was also moved there. It was used as a skateboarding rink until the site was demolished in 1982.

 
 

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