Guildhall

A guildhall, or guild hall, is a building historically used by guilds for meetings. It is also the official or colloquial name for many of these specific buildings, now often used as town halls or museums.

The Low Countries used to have guildhalls in every city, often one for each trade with the gildenhuis (Dutch, literally 'guild house') demonstrating the guild's status by elaborate buildings, occasionally a hall to be used by all the city's guilds.

Lists of guildhalls

Belgium

• The Round Table (or Tafelrond, in Dutch) in Leuven. Designed 1479 by Matheus de Layens, guildhall built 1480-1487 internally comprising 3 houses, demolished 1817, reconstructed following original plans 1921. The old building's meeting rooms had been let to the guilds; the new had been in use by a bank and became a personal private propery.<ref

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• House The Salmon (or De Zalm, in Dutch) in Mechelen. Built ca. 1530 in early Renaissance style by architect Willem van Wechtere for the prosperous fishermen's guild, it is one of the city's finest historical houses. The artist Willem Geets (1839–1919) used to live there. In the mid-20th century it became city property and held a museum, then the Tourist Information Office, and later again a museum.

United Kingdom

• Bath Guildhall
• Blakeney Guildhall
• Boston Guildhall
• Cambridge...... ...
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