The old building of the first municipality of Colombo (Old Town Hall) is slightly lost among the shopping streets of Pettah. To look at the magnificent architecture of the period of English rule. The building is dated 1865, and the first meeting of the Council of local government held in January 1866 it was also the judiciary.
Old Town Hall was active until 1928, until the New Town Hall (Town Hall), which operates to this day in the North-Eastern part of the Park Viharamahadevi, was built.
The building is right smack in the middle of all the little shops and street stalls of Pettah. It’s all arches, needle point columns, crumbly yellow walls and creaky staircases. Floor boards are mahogany, windows are a bit of an unusual design.
Today the building is a modest museum, but its exhibits are not in the best condition. On the ground floor consists preserved steam engines, machinery and old equipment. In one of the rooms life-size dolls sitting around a wooden table in different postures: a replica of a council meeting in 1906.
Rumour has it that the council members come alive at night! And that while you walk back down those old stairs, you can hear their whispers through the wooden floorboards.
There’s an adjacent room from this council chamber flanked by lovely tinted arched glass – here you find an old map of Colombo from 1785, some very old type-writers, an old radio.
Credit – Our Planet, Yamu
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