The stateliest of the county courthouses of West Texas is this Classical Revival composition of brick and limestone that replaced the 1884 courthouse by Oscar Ruffini. The wide facade consists of a screen of eighteen colossal limestone Corinthian columns that stands three stories above a raised basement. A window wall is set back behind these columns, with double-height courtroom spaces visible on the second floor. A limestone entablature and a tall limestone parapet lined with anthemia conclude the building. Inside, through bronze doors, there is just a small foyer with polychromed columns and pilasters
Despite the monumentality of the courthouse, San Angelo’s courthouse square is anticlimactic. The original city block is halved by S. Court Street, with the courthouse squeezed between it and S. Irving Street to the east. Newer, freestanding buildings irregularly face the streets around the courthouse, denying it the civic environment implied by its grand colonnade.