Brighton’s Odeon cinema is to get a facelift to replace its weather-beaten cladding.
The seafront picture house is also reinstating a large first floor window overlooking the seafront, which is currently covered by a rusting advertising hoarding.
And the white render facade will be replaced with ceramic tiles which it’s hoped will withstand the coastal elements for longer.
The application, written by McFarlane Latter Architects, says: “Lately the facades are showing signs of wear (rust staining, flaking paint etc) and Odeon have approached the Landlord to change the surface finish of the facades and the box window to the south elevation
Instead of a concrete finish the intention is to use large ceramic ‘limestone’ tiles with a ‘limestone’ print in an ashlar pattern.
“We are employing the maximum size of tile available (3.0 x 1.0 m) as the largest tile in the ashlar pattern with surrounding tiles of shorter height in the courses between.
“The ashlar pattern gives interest close-to, while the colour matched joints (minimum 8mm) maintain the desired ‘monolithic’ look from a distance.
“The ceramic printed tile gives a near perfect match to natural limestone with the added durability of ceramic tiles.
“Printing is done at very high temperatures, is permanent and will not delaminate in any way.
“The salt air and its corrosive ability is a major consideration. Risk of rust staining from iron deposits in the natural stone is removed with ceramic tiles.
“The tiles are supported on an aluminium secondary frame system to similarly avoid rusting. ”
The building is owned by Aberdeen Standard Investments, which just sold the neighbouring Churchill Square shopping centre to Ingka Group, the owners of Ikea.
Odeon has been the largest tenant ince the 1970s and occupies half the ground and all of the upper floors.
The Prizm nightclub occupies the rest of the ground floor and the basement.
Odeon is responsible for maintaining the building shell.
Before Odeon moved in, the building was called the Top Rank Suite. It opened in November 1965, the first part of the new West Street and Churchill Square redevelopment.
In December 1966 a ten-pin bowling alley and an ice rink were added. The bowling alley closed in 1970 and the ice rink the following year.
In 1972 the building was re-named the Kingswest and it was split into several bars and a cinema.
Whilst it’s nice it’s getting a spruce up I can’t help but feel ultimately disappointed because it suggests the building isn’t going anywhere soon. Frankly there’s only so much dressing you can cover it with and it just isn’t a nice building. It’s long past its best and we could be doing so much more with the huge prime space it occupies.
To have so much sea facing frontage and no windows is absolutely criminal. Why do we need a cheap, nasty cinema in this building? I get there’s a need for a low end cinema as an alternative to the high end experiences of the Picture House cinemas and the mid tier Cineworld at the marina, but you could stick an Odeon anywhere. Why not make use of the dead space occupied currently by decrepit old unused office blocks between London Road and the station?
Best get your cheque book out and invest in it yourself.
hate to dampen such 1st grade snobbery but picturehouse is cheaper than odeon
Lets see… cinema in the centre of the city, next to large car parks, bus and rail travel. Ideal for tourists and simple to nip into after visiting the shops. After a film a stroll down the sea front and head to a restaurant or takeaway.
Or dumped in London Road. With all that London Road has to offer.
@Krist – do you even live in this city? What on earth would you put here instead?
Yes yes, quite so. Should stay exactly where it is, just get spruced-up.
We can probably all agree that the architecture is poor. Particularly for the location. But the alternative location seems poor from a commercial pov. There’s clearly some advantage in being right in the city centre rather than a secondary location.
Meanwhile, is the signage to the non-existent bar still in place 🤣
Best it was better before they built this monster be good to see what the area used to look like.
Pivturehouse are owned by Cineworld
An amazing sought after location thrown away by a ghastly building not worthy of prime Brighton seafront position.Not wanting to be course but there is a saying You can’t polish a t..d.Say no more
The interior is as bad as the exteriour if not worse, the audutoriums are all filthy, full of broken chairs, some with broken sound that only work on 1 side of the building, the tabs have long been done away with but 1 screen still has them hanging off the track and accros the corner of the screen.
The smallest screen which is under ground stinks like raw sewerage and has suddenly wet carpets The toilets are rotten and stink so bad, the lift has been broken for months and months, upstairs is just a mass of empty space so why put a window in or are they just pulling the stickers off it, Why not move the entrance to the front rather down a piss filled passage with abusive beggars and druggies lining the passage. Why not just knock it down and build a decent multiples with imax if the purse won’t streach to those levels why not refurbished it into an Odeon Luxe.
You can’t polish a turd.. but you can roll it in glitter.