A City in Celebration

Cambridge Corn Exchange has long been a place for celebrations, and it has always gone big! The Corn Exchange has been regularly transformed into a ballroom including for the infamous ‘May Balls’ of the University of Cambridge, events which, despite their name, take place in June. Regularly partnered with the Guildhall for these large balls, on more than one occasion, a temporary bridge or covered walkway has been erected over Wheeler Street so that party goers could move between the two venues without having to walk on the street.

‘Few realise the lavish expenditure on the May Balls held in Cambridge Corn Exchange. After the corn merchants have vacated the building on the Saturday evening a small army of workmen take possession. They labour until midnight when the advent of the Sabbath and the strict rules governing municipal buildings shut them out for 24 hours. With the first hour of Monday morning they re-enter and by eight that evening the place is transformed into an artistic ballroom through which not a vestige of the prosaic Corn Exchange is seen. What of the cost? There is not less than £2,000 worth of goods in the ball room; add to that the cost of utilising the Guildhall as a supper room and include the china and plates for the supper and you have a total of some thousands of pounds to provide our moneyed visitors with an evening’s entertainment.’ Cambridge Daily News 2.7.1904