Market Hall
Completed in 1841, Market Hall was one of several monumental buildings that arose along Meeting Street in Charleston during the 1830s and early 1840s.
(Charleston). Completed in 1841, Market Hall was one of several monumental buildings that arose along Meeting Street in Charleston during the 1830s and early 1840s. Located at 188 Meeting Street, Market Hall occupies a narrow lot between North and South Market Streets that had been used as the public market since the late eighteenth century. It was designed in the form of a Roman temple by Edward Brickell White, the most successful Charleston architect of the late antebellum period. The two-story building is set on a rusticated base and is built of brick covered with a brownstone stucco. The second story is scored in an ashlar pattern. A double flight of brownstone steps leads to a pedimented portico supported by four Doric columns. The elaborate entablature includes bucrania, ram skulls, and triglyphs. The moldings of the column capitals and bases extend along the side and rear elevations. Behind the building, sheds stretch toward the river, which provided space for merchants selling meats, produce, seafood, and other goods in earlier years. The United Daughters of the Confederacy have met in the building since 1899 and in the early twenty-first century used it for their Confederate Museum. Market Hall sustained damage during Hurricane Hugo in 1989 and underwent a $3.5 million restoration that was completed in 2002. The building was designated a National Historic Landmark by the U.S. Department of the Interior in 1973.
Lane, Mills. Architecture of the Old South: South Carolina. Savannah, Ga.: Beehive, 1984.
Poston, Jonathan H. The Buildings of Charleston: A Guide to the City’s Architecture. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1997.
Severens, Kenneth. Charleston Antebellum Architecture and Civic Destiny. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1988.
