The old part of the hall was built in 1877 as Gisburn National School and in 1913, on the opening of the new school, it became Gisburn Parish Rooms.
On the 15th June 1951 the hall was given by deed of gift to the village of Gisburn for use by the all the people, without political or religious bias. The land is held in trust by Gisburn Parish Council. The donors of the gift were the late Harold Hindley Esq, William Heaton Esq and Edward William Fattorini Esq who were responsible for the Parish Rooms. A Management Committee was formed which began the task of raising funds to enlarge and renovate the existing hall.
The extension consisted of the main hall with stage area and two small dressing rooms. The old village school component comprised a committee room with kitchen area attached. There were also male and female toilets and a single disabled toilet was added later. The work was completed in 1959 and the Hall was renamed Gisburn Festival Hall because 1951, the year of the donation, was 'Festival of Britain' year.
In 1996 Gisburn Festival Hall was registered as a charity and fundraising was started to re-roof the hall this work was completed in 1998.
In 2003 a major project was started with the original aim to replace the old hall with a new building, however this had to be abandoned and a major refurbishment project was carried out. To date the main hall has been remolded to create more storage space, a new disabled toilet and a child's toilet. A large additional car park has been built and disabled access to the hall created. The gas central heating system has recently been replaced with an eco-friendly air-sourced heat pump and underfloor heating and all the external walls and ceiling have been insulated to conserve energy.