O is for Odeon - again!

If you’re one of the folk who make up the 881,221 views of my blog, then you’ll know by now that I’m often writing about our local cinemas! I’ve put a link to some of those other posts about them in the notes below.

So, there could only be one candidate for an entry in the A–Z Blogging Challenge, in which I’m focussing on Art Deco in Loughborough, for the Letter O – and that would be Odeon!! And, there can only be one Odeon in Loughborough, can’t there? Well, yes, technically only one at a time, but the Odeon has been in two different buildings in the town, and notably, each having an Art Deco connection.

So, let’s have a look at Loughborough’s first Odeon, despite the fact that it was not the first of the two buildings to be built.

What is now the Beacon Bingo building on Baxter Gate, a building which is now owned by the Junction Church who are renovating it, was opened as an Odeon cinema. This was back in November 1936, when cinemas were hugely popular, and more and more were being built. Of course, Loughborough already had two other cinemas at the time the Odeon came along, but that didn’t deter Oscar Deutsch, who had built his first cinema in Brierley Hill in 1928, his first of the Odeon brand in 1930 at Perry Barr, and who by 1941 had overseen the opening of 258 Odeons in the UK.

Being built at the height of the Art Deco period, Loughborough’s Odeon on Baxter Gate is of the streamline moderne style, with its beautiful curved corners, its brilliant basket-weave biscuit-coloured faience tiles complemented by the striking black and green bands of stripes at the top and bottom of the building, and the marble-effect steps leading up to the entrance doors. The cinema’s first manager Clarence George Starkey was an entertainer extraordinaire, and made the most of his creative skills to ensure the success of the Odeon cinema.

Meanwhile, over on the other side of town, the Empire Cinema had opened in 1914, and as well as being a cinema, also had an entertainment space within. In 1929 the building was modernised slightly, but it wasn’t until 1936 that it had its Art Deco frontage that we know today, added. Although re-opened a month before the Odeon on Baxter Gate, so in October 1936, the building style, with its fabulous geometric tower, is quite a contrast to the original Odeon, isn’t it? if you pop along Town Hall Passage you can catch a glimpse of the beautiful stained glass windows from the outside, and the ghost sign of the building’s original name on the outside wall. This cinema went through numerous name changes, but today is Loughborough’s Odeon cinema, and now the only cinema in town.    

 

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Notes

O is for Odeon 

So Who was Clarence George Starkey

Loughborough and its cinemas

Jarrow Marchers and Loughborough cinemas

Art Deco in Loughborough

Cinema memories

H is for Hathern Station Brick and Terra Cotta Company, Hathernware, and the HodsonFamily

Empire Cinema, WW2, and Sir Malcolm Sargent

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I'm taking part in the A-Z April Blogging Challenge!!

 

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Posted by lynneaboutloughborough

With apologies for typos which are all mine!

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