The view of the church hall from Gisborne Street shows the Bookroom on the ground floor at the left. Above this is rented office space. On the right, the ground floor is taken up with the Hughes room, above which is the parish office. The main hall area is behind these offices, and faces on to a courtyard between the church and hall buildings.

The building was originally designed to house the church school, and a gift of 5,000 pounds from Isabell Hughes, wife of the then vicar, Ernest Selwyn Hughes, made the construction possible. The building was designed by Alexander North, an English architect who had developed a distinguished practice in Tasmania. He was recognized for ecclesiastical designs, and was comissioned to design a complex which would include not only schoolrooms, but also a hall, and space for 'a thousand and one parochial agencies and clubs'. The hall was opened by Lord Denman, the Governor-General, on the 26th of June, 1913.