One or two odd things on Tower Street

A fox toting a set of bagpipes is not exactly a rarity but one smoking a pipe  ... you don't see that everyday. I believe there was also an elephant in this antique shop's front room.

Across the street on Tower Street

And this is Tower Street but that is not the tower to which it refers. That is the Majestic cinema, built mid 1920s and still going strong.

The Tower

I've shown this former cinema before but so long ago that a revisit is almost obligatory. The place has had many uses it is now a night club called Funktion. The domes I've learned (and should have remembered but you know how the memory fades with age) are replacements after the originals were removed illegally in 2003ish. I like this place; its designers seemed to have taken as many architectural ornaments as they could carry and stuck them together in a pleasing fashion.

I've read that it is equally flash inside. You want a sneeky peek inside? Try this from when the place was closed a few years ago.

The Cecil

I can't believe I haven't posted this former cinema before now. It stands on the corner of Ferensway and Anlaby Road. The Cecil was opened in 1955 with a screening of the Seven Year Itch. It has a rather dull looking exterior perhaps because the architects, local firm Gelder & Kitchen, were more noted for designing flour mills than cinemas.  This was where I saw the last film I paid to go watch, (Splash, since you ask, with Daryl Hannah as a mermaid, yeah I know, pathetic!) and as I'm told it closed as a cinema in 1992 that just shows what an avid film buff I am. The building is now a Mecca bingo hall. The picture is a reflection in a window of Europa House which was built on the site of the original Cecil which stood on the opposite corner until May 8th 1941 when it was destroyed by the Germans dropping bombs on it as was the style in those days.

Weekend reflections are here.

The Old Picture Palace

Here's the art deco-ish front of what was originally the Kinemacolour Picture Palace opened back in 1910, that title was clearly too much for Hullensians so it became the Regent and stayed open as a cinema until 1978. After a spell as a roller disco(?) it became a pub. It is now part of a chain of pubs named after a confectioner from Chester-le-Street. This place is the sort of place that has to serve beer in plastic containers to avoid the risk of serious damage in those customer-on-customer disagreements that inevitably arise in the fiery heat of teleological disputation ...

Mayfair meets Hollywood and Vine

Here are the mortal remains of the Mayfair cinema on a rather dull day. For thirty five years it showed the celluloid products of the movie industry before the little shiny box in the corner of the sitting room finally shut it down in 1964. Still there was life in the old building and it reopened the next year as a bingo hall. So for a while it was the mecca for pairs of fat ladies but even this business moved onto bigger and newer premises on Clough Road of all places. Then came the relaxed licencing laws and a boom in pub openings so it was turned into the Hogshead pub in 1998. At the height of this booze craze there about half a dozen new pubs in a half mile stretch on Beverley Road. A classic bubble that has now gone well and truly bust. I think only two are still open. Things were clearly not going too well when the name changed to Hollywood and Vine in 2011 (the sillier a pub name the sooner it goes belly-up). And now it's for sale. Surely this can't be the final reel in this story.

Picture Houses

This view has two of Hull's old cinemas. The Tower which I showed you a few days ago and the Regent which was built in 1910 and was open until 1978. The Regent is now a pub called Horners.
The archway is a side entrance to Paragon station. After taking this picture I noticed lots of signs threatening prosecution for trespassing on railway property so I left. 

For Sale May Rent

This is the Tower on Anlaby Road. It opened in 1914 as a cinema. In 1978 it closed and since then it has been a boxing venue, a roller disco and eventually as a night club and fun pub. It is currently for sale.
The Cinema Theatre Association wants someone to buy the place with a view to returning it to a cinema. All the original plaster work is still there. So with a bit of luck Hull might get another cinema.
You can read here about local memories of the place through the years.