Following the French Revolution, the town council initially met at the house of the mayor at the time. This arrangement continued until the mid-19th century, when the council started using a room at the Charpentier Institution on the west side Rue de l'Aistre (now Rue de la République). The Charpentier Institution was a boarding school for boys which had been established at the instigation of Marie Pape-Carpantier in around 1850. The building consisted of a main block facing onto Rue de l'Aistre and two wings which were projected forward to form a courtyard. The building was occupied by Prussian troops in 1870 during the Franco-Prussian War and, due to its dilapidated condition, it was abandoned after the war.[1]
In 1876, the council led by the mayor, Joseph Guerbigny, was granted permission to demolish the Charpentier Institution and to erect a combined town hall and school on the site. This was a modest building three-bay structure known as "L'hôtel de la Mairie".[2]
Then in the early 20th century, the council led by the mayor, Germeuil Guerbigny, decided to demolish the combined town hall and school and to erect a more substantial town hall on the same site. The new building was designed by Sieur Cabany in the neoclassical style, built in millstone and was officially opened by the sub-prefect of the department, Georges Charles Winandy, on 27 May 1906.[3][4]
The design involved a symmetrical main frontage of five bays facing onto the street. The central bay featured a short flight of steps leading up to a porch with a round-headed opening and voussoirs. On the first floor, there was a segmental headed French door with a balustraded balcony. The other bays were fenestrated by segmental headed windows on both floors. At roof level, there was a clock with a semi-circular surround and a finial above the central bay and a pair of dormer windows. Internally, the principal rooms were the Salle des Mariages (wedding room) and the Salle de Conseil (council chamber) on the first floor of the building.[5]
An extension, built behind the town hall in concrete and glass at a cost of €4.1 million, to a design by Graal Architects, was completed in June 2023.[6][7][8] The design involved a long two-storey block set behind the original building. The section to the south featured a series of columns supporting the first-floor structure, so allowing vehicle access underneath, while the section to the north featured a glass fronted entrance on the ground floor, so allowing pedestrian access. On the first floor, both sections were faced with vertical ceramic strips in shades of grey and fenestrated by a series of lancet windows.[9][10][11]
