Shipley Picture House
Briggate,
Shipley,
BD17
Briggate,
Shipley,
BD17
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Located in Shipley, near Bradford, it opened on 21st October 1907 as the Queen’s Palace Theatre. It was a conversion by architects Empsall & Clarkson of a former coffee palace, with a seating capacity of 300. It was closed on 30th May 1908 and re-opened on 3rd August 1908 with ‘animated pictures’.
The Queen’s Palace Theatre closed in early-1914 for conversion to a cinema. The grand opening for the Shipley Picture House was December 13, 1915 and the seating capacity had been increased to 900. Again, the architects were Empsall & Clarkson. In 1929 the Shipley Picture House closed briefly for renovations which included installation of a Western Electric sound system. The theatre reopened on October 28, 1929 with a programme of Kine-Variety.
The Shipley Picture House closed August 31st 1932 and the last movie shown there was "A Honeymoon Adventure". The building was used as a training centre for Sea Cadets until 1960. Later, the empty building was damaged by fire and demolished in the 1960’s.
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Lost Memory
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Recent comments (view all 2 comments)
HJHill:I have reset the Google Map, if you wish to now set the correct streetview.
In the Kinematograph Year Book 1914 the owners are exotically titled the “Franco-British Animated Picture Co”.
Given that it closed in 1932, it managed to be listed in KYB 1935, 1940 and 1945 (but not after that) and as having 1550 seats and Western Electric sound!
The closing film, A Honeymoon Adventure, was made by Associated Talking Picture and released in September 1931. The SPH’s top-of-the-range Western Electric sound installation could hardly have had time to pay for itself by closure in August 1932; probably two years at the most. G J Mellor in ‘The Cinemas of Bradford’ has “Spotlamps and stage fittings transferred to the Glenroyal”. Perhaps that went for the WE equipment too. The SPH closed on Wednesday 31 August; the Glenroyal opened on Monday 5 September.