Le Stapled Halle

The earliest reference to a site at Staple Inn can be traced back to Norman times. In 1292 it contained a building known as ‘le Stapled Halle’, which was probably a covered market. The “Staple” originated in a duty on wool that was introduced in 1275 at the “request of the communities of merchants” with the intention that the burden of tax should fall on the foreign buyers of wool.

It is not clear how the Society of Staple Inn, an organisation of lawyers, came into existence. The evidence available suggests that it did so from 1415, when the name Staple Inn appears to have been used first by lawyers and students who formed the Society.

A new hall

Staple Inn remained owned by woolstaplers, probably until 1580 when the members of the Society built a new Hall on its current site. The Fellows of the Society were wealthy men and their Hall reflected this. The hammerbeam roof was probably a gift from Richard Champion because his arms were carved on the corbel over the oriel window. The newly built Hall also contained the stained glass from the original Hall and the four panels in the window of the north wall display the arms of those whose donations made the building of the Hall possible. The Hall would have been heated by an open fire under the tower which provided ventilation.

Fire, deathwatch beetles, and a bomb

In 1756 a fire broke out in No 1, the door immediately adjacent to the Hall. The Hall was not damaged but the rebuilding of other rooms that were destroyed is commemorated in the inscription above the door ‘Surrexit ex Flamis Anno don. 1757. Thoma. Leech Principali Iterumque reaedificata 1954’. The reference to 1954 is a reminder that having survived a plague of deathwatch beetles in 1922, the Hall and the rest of Staple Inn were destroyed during the Second World War. It was also in 1757 that the clock was made with three faces onto the courtyard, Hall and garden.

By 1800 the number of legal students passing on to Grays Inn Road decreased considerably and the Inns of Court adopted rules that effectively demoted Staple Inn to an association of attorneys and others who occupied Chambers and in 1884 it was purchased by the Prudential Assurance Company for £65,000. In 1887 Staple Inn became the home of the Institute of Actuaries having been leased for £250 a year.

Restoration

In 1936 the old buildings at the front of Staple Inn on High Holborn were completely restored having survived in their original condition since 1586. The restoration centred on the oak frontage and the lead windows.

War and a flying bomb

At 7.30 p.m. on Thursday 24 August 1944, Staple Inn Hall was destroyed by a flying bomb. Fortunately the stained-glass windows had been placed in storage and so they survived intact. It was March 1954 before permission was finally obtained to rebuild the Hall on the site as closely as possible to the original design. The mechanism of the three-faced clock, housed on the gallery, is made up mostly of its original parts. It is supposed that one roof truss above the gallery has been reconstructed from the first oak and the carved pendants and features on the new trusses are mostly original. However, this is disputed by some who claim that it is likely that the components of the roof are entirely original – if not it represents an “unrivalled antique faking”. The roof remains an object for study, wonder and debate.

The Council Chamber (left) adjacent to the Hall has a white stone fireplace that incorporates an Elizabethan carving that was found buried in a wall during the reconstruction of another building in the courtyard after the bomb destruction.

Refurbishment

In 1996 the Institute decided to refurbish the Hall. Its architects looked to illustrations of the nineteenth century Hall which was atmospheric and evocative of over 400 years of history, yet incorporated many modern mechanical and electrical features to improve the day to day operations of the Hall and the comfort of its users.

The Hall that you see today is a mixture of the original architectural features and the convenience of the twenty-first century.

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