The former Odeon Cinema in Morecambe (1937), now operating as a hardware and bathroom supply shop, has been Grade II listed by DCMS following support from C20 Society.
With a powerful urban presence that anchors the building as a gateway to the town, its striking and complex massing includes a slender round-ended tower, projecting flat roof and expressed high-level corridor. Though some external features have been boarded over or lost, the auditorium retains its proscenium arch with many original decorative finishes and characteristic Odeon style fixtures thought to remain, concealed by modern partitions, ceilings and floors.
The Odeon company was formed in 1930 by Oscar Deutsch. Between 1936 and 1939 it opened 96 new cinemas in England, mostly in a distinctive Streamlined Moderne style influenced by German Expressionism, and usually with an exterior mixing brown brick with cream tiling.
This ‘house style’ had been developed by Cecil Clavering and Robert Bullivant in the Birmingham architect’s firm of Harry Weedon and Partners, one of two firms which produced most of Odeon’s designs. Morecambe’s Odeon cinema was built in 1937, during a period of rapid expansion for the chain.
The architect William Calder Robson designed seven Odeon’s for the practice Harry Weedon, three of which survive. Morecambe now joins Harrogate (1936) and Blackpool (1938-39) on the National Heritage List for England.
The Twentieth Century Society campaign to save outstanding buildings and design that have shaped the British landscape since 1914. Some are iconic, others are little-known gems, but all of them are irreplaceable and many are under threat