Tag Archives: dorset

Regent: a cinema regenerated in a small town in Dorset

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OVER THE YEARS, many cinemas that were opened in the first half of the 20th century have either been closed or converted to be used for other purposes. A substantial number of them were built in the Art Deco style, which flourished in the 1920s and ‘30s. Some cinemas, such as the Ionic and the ABC in Golders Green and the Odeon in Temple Fortune, have been demolished. Others became bingo halls or meeting places for religious groups. The Coronet in Notting Hill Gate began life as a theatre, then became a cinema, and is now a theatre again. During a recent visit to Christchurch in Dorset, I saw a cinema, designed in the Art Deco style, which is still in business.

The Regent Cinema stands on Christchurch’s High Street. It is in pristine condition – a fine example of Art Deco architecture and internal design – it looks as if it has been built recently. Opened on Boxing Day 1931, it continued showing films until it closed in July 1973. After that, like so many other cinemas, it was operated by the Mecca company as a bingo hall and social club. This functioned until it closed in 1982. Late that year, the building was purchased by Christchurch Borough Council.

The local authority together with over 100 volunteers restored the Regent to its original Art Deco glory. In June 1983, the Regent Centre with its cinema were opened for use. Since then, the restoration of the cinema has continued and technological improvements have been made (e.g., digital cinema has been introduced). Very recently (in 2021) further work has been done to recreate the original cinema (e.g., the cinema’s seats, carpet and colour schemes, have been restored to their original appearance, and 35 mm projection has returned). Given all this loving care the cinema has received, it is no wonder that it looks like new. Now, it is mainly run by keen volunteers.  It is very heartening to discover a cinema that has survived closure and repurposing and lived to return to being used for the purpose it was originally designed. On the Sunday morning that we visited it, we were unable to enter the auditorium because it was filled with children enjoying the screening of a film. However, the ticket office contains a good set of photographs of the restored cinema’s interior.

Shelley died abroad and is remembered in Dorset

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THE PRIORY CHURCH in Christchurch (Dorset) is all that remains intact of the Priory of the Holy Trinity, one of many monastic institutions dissolved by King Henry VIII. The king allowed the cathedral-like priory church to be preserved and used as Christchurch’s parish church. The rest of the priory was demolished. The church’s construction began in the Norman era, the nave being completed by about 1150. The church contains many fine Norman architectural and decorative features. On the north wall at the west end of the building, at the bottom of the square bell tower, there is a 19th century monument that commemorates one of England’s great poets and his equally famous wife, a novelist.

In 1816, the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822) married the novelist, author of “Frankenstein”, Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (1797-1851). Six years later, Percy was in Italy, where he met Leigh Hunt and Lord Byron to discuss establishing a new journal to be called ‘The Liberal’. During this trip, Shelley died at sea (on the 1st of July 1822). His body was washed up near Viareggio ten day later. It was cremated on the beach. However, his heart resisted burning (possibly because it was highly calcified due to a tubercular infection). His ashes were buried in the Protestant Cemetery in Rome, and his heart was eventually buried either at St Peters Church in Bournemouth or at the Priory Church in Christchurch, Mary, Percy’s wife, died in her home in London’s Chester Square, but was buried at St Peter’s Church in Bournemouth, which was near her seaside home at Boscombe (now part of Bournemouth).

The monument to Percy and Mary in the Priory Church was sculpted in white marble by Henry Weekes (1807-1877) in 1853-54. It was erected by Percy and Mary’s son, who lived at Boscombe. The memorial:

“… shows Mary Wollstenecraft Shelley mourning over the body of her husband who drowned off the coast of Italy in 1822.” (https://victorianweb.org/sculpture/weekes/8.html).

After attending Sung Eucharist one Sunday morning in October (2022), we asked the cleric why the monument was in the Priory Church. He was not entirely sure of the reason, but suggested that at the time when the memorial was put up, Bournemouth was far smaller than its older neighbour Christchurch. He explained that before the arrival of the railway in 1870, Bournemouth was a smallish place, a village, and that Christchurch was a far larger and more important place, a town, in the area. Whatever the explanation, it was interesting to discover this monument to Shelley during our visit to the beautiful, venerable Priory Church.

Take me to the Tivoli

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WIMBORNE IS A CHARMING small town in Dorset, a little north of Poole and Bournemouth. Famed for its Minster church with its mediaeval chained library, the place is rich in old buildings. One of these, looking less old than many of its neighbours, houses the Tivoli Theatre. It attracted my attention because of its (heavily restored) art deco features.

Housed in what was originally the 18th century Borough House, the theatre-cum-cinema was created in 1936 to the designs of Edward de Wilde-Holding, a prolific architect. The cinema was closed in 1980 and was threatened with demolition for a road scheme, which fortunately was abandoned. It was restored by a group called ‘Voluntary Friends of the Tivoli’ and reopened in 1993. In addition to showing films, the theatre is used for live events on its stage.

The Tivoli was not the only art deco cinema we spotted on our recent trip to the area around Winchester. 28 miles northeast of Wimborne, there is another one, The Plaza in Romsey, which was built in 1931 as a cinema but is now used as a theatre. Unlike the Tivoli in Wimborne, which occupies an old building, the Plaza in Romsey was purpose-built as a cinema.

From Egypt to Dorset

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CLEOPATRA’S NEEDLE IS a familiar landmark in London. It was originally erected at Heliopolis in Ancient Egypt in about 1450 BC and brought to London in about 1877. Less well-known is another hieroglyph covered obelisk in the gardens of Kingston Lacy near Wimborne in Dorset.

The pink granite obelisk at Kingston Lacy arrived in the grounds of this rich family’s dwelling in about 1827. Like Cleopatra’s Needle, this monument is inscribed with hieroglyphics. Because there is a mixture of Greek words and hieroglyphics, the obelisk, discovered on an island in the River Nile, became important in the early attempts to decipher the Ancient Egyptian writing.

In Banke’s collection of Egyptian artefacts at Kingston Lacy

Kingston Lacy has been owned by successive generations of the Bankes family since the 1660s, when John Bankes (1589-1644) took possession of the estate and built the present grand house. One of his descendants, William John Bankes (1786-1855), who met Lord Byron when they were both studying at Cambridge University, first travelled in Spain and collected a vast number of Spanish paintings, many of which are hanging within Kingston Lacy House. Later, during the early part of the 19th century, William travelled extensively in the Middle East and along The Nile. During his travels, he collected many valuable Ancient Egyptian artefacts, some of which are beautifully displayed in a former billiards room within Kingston Lacy House.

The obelisk was found by Bankes at Philae in Upper Egypt in 1815. According to Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philae_obelisk), the inscriptions on the object:

“… record a petition by the Egyptian priests at Philae and the favourable response by Ptolemy VIII Euergetes and queens Cleopatra II and Cleopatra III, who reigned together from 144-132 BC and again from 126-116 BC. The priests sought financial aid to help them deal with the large numbers of pilgrims visiting their sanctuary and the king and queens granted the sanctuary a tax exemption.”

Both the Greek and the Egyptian inscriptions deal with the same topic but are not direct translations of each other.