The picture is from the Scottish Cinemas website.

This building’s main claim to fame is that the Beatles once played there. I think it was when they were just on the cusp of fame. I wasn’t around at the time. (Not in Fife anyway.)

Like many cinemas it failed to survive the changing times and is now demolished.

Shame it’s gone, though.

The above image is from Scotland’s Places where there are four more pictures of the former cinema.

I just missed photographing this one for myself. By the time I started blogging it had been demolished. It’s a pity they couldn’t find a way to retain the facade.

A photo of the cinema in its heyday (taken from Burntisland.Net) is below.

Also in that Burntisland.Net link is a photo of the single remaining stained glass window which was removed before demolition plus two pictures relating to its post-cinema use.

More photos can be seen on the Scottish Cinemas website, including 65 of the interior prior to demolition.

A few years there was a proposal to fill the gap with a shop and flats. I’ve not been to Burntisland recently so don’t know if anything came of it.

Lured by the promise of a book sale we also ventured into the part of Market Street that leads towards the Bus Station and came upon this combination of buildings, something to do with the University now – the Careers Office? – which has a deco style facade. The photo is a stitch of two.

Judging by the pictures on Google Maps it seems to have been refurbished recently.

This is the former Gaumont (later Odeon, Classic and De Luxe) Cinema, Mill Street, Alloa.
According to the Scottish cinemas website it was the last Gaumont to be built pre-war, and the only purpose built Gaumont in Scotland.

Below is a photo of the upper level of a building on Primrose Street, now sadly unoccupied.

At the junction of Shillinghill and Mill Street you can see this:-

Perhaps not really deco but the bits that resemble chimneys have the look.

As part of my quest to photograph old Woolworths premises here is the Alloa variety. It’s right next to the former cinema and has been taken over by Poundland. Not deco, it looks of 1960s or 70s vintage to me.

A couple more pictures of these buildings are on my flickr site.

This was on a wet day last summer. I’ve only just got round to tidying it up for showing.

The cinema was once a Mecca then a Vogue but was more lately the location for Allied Vehicles. It looks shut now though.

Its history is on the Scottish cinemas website.

I went there quite a few times when I was a student. Gone With The Wind is one I remember particularly well. The good lady hadn’t seen it and so I took her. She wasn’t all that impressed by the film partly due to the bum numbing experience but also the fact that the story and acting weren’t of the best. She wouldn’t have been disposed to like it anyway, though, given that the book was my mother’s favourite and my mother hadn’t ever taken to her. Never did: even after we were married. Strange woman, my mother. (I can get away with that since she died a long time ago. So it goes.) But I have to agree; it’s not a great film, perhaps not even a good one.

This is the cinema entrance on Vinicombe Street as it looks now.

The side alley was cluttered with bins and such on the day.

The other side presents to much better effect.

There seems to be a sort of church architecture to the rear of this as you go down Cranworth Street. You can see it to the left above and to the right below.

This is the view of the building from Cresswell Street.

Photos of the cinema now and in its heyday can be seen on the Scottish cinemas website.

The first thing that strikes you on the way in from the south is a huge memorial surmounted by a lion with a long straight tail. Just below, at the road junction, is the war memorial.

A crop showing the war memorial is left. I much prefer these dignified ones to those with angels all over them. Once again many more names from The Great War than from WW2.

The photo (right) is of the tower on the hill crest.

This was apparently erected by grateful tenants after The Duke of Northumberland reduced their rents.

That, on seeing how much they could afford by way of a monument to him, he immediately put up the rents again is seemingly only a rumour. We walked up to it and it is undeniably impressive. Here’s the inscription:-

The base also has lions; at its four corners.

The two memorials are across the road from what used to be Alnwick railway station. The building now houses what claims to be “Britain’s biggest second hand bookshop” Barter Books.

It’s packed with books, to be sure.

In keeping with its setting in the old station there are train sets running around above your head in the middle part of the shop. You can see the “Keep Calm And Carry On” poster from World War 2 in the next photo. I think this is the shop where it was rediscovered.

Had it claimed to be Britain’s most expensive second hand bookshop I’d have been more sure of its right to the title. Old 1960s paperbacks were priced well over £2 and I didn’t see any hardbacks below £9.60. They did have a computerised “search the stock” service if you were looking for a particular book though.

There’s a lovely old entrance arch to the main part of the town just like in York etc.

And what do you know? Just behind where I took the above photo lies an Art Deco cinema.

It’s complete with glass bricks! (See close up of the nicely rounded entranceway: right.)

The cinema also doubles as a theatre. The forthcoming productions were advertised on the windows further along past the entrance.

The bulbous bit halfway along the building – just where the van is parked in the photo – has a nice deco frieze running along it.

The towery bits are hexagonal and have deco steps at the top. The fenestration is modern and “eyes poked out” to my mind.

It’s a pity about the lamp-post in this second photo but it does show off the balcony better.

The cinema is of course no longer showing films. It’s a pub/function place known as “The Carousel” now.

This is an Art Deco building in commercial use fronting onto the street known as the East Port.

A lawyer’s at the moment. Lots of horizontals and verticals.

The side of the building is almost as characterful. You can just see the metal balustrade on the roof towards the rear.

From the side. The extractor fans and fire escape spoil the appearance a bit. The metal balustrade on the roof is more obvious from here. I like the overlaps of the roof edges.

The sticky-out bit at the back. Pity about the fire escape gubbins. Typical rectangular chimney.

The picture below is of the building directly across the East Port. It is the former cinema known in its heyday as the Orient Express. It’s a stitch of two photos. I couldn’t get far enough back to get the whole thing in one shot.

The cinema was built in 1913, before the Deco era, but has some styling to the frontage so I thought I’d post it here. It was converted to a night club in 2004 but that has since closed.

The street seems to double as a bus station so there’s a bus in this first one.
The bus had moved on by the time I took the second.

Typical Deco styling here, lots of vertical/horizontal interplay. It’s a strange mixture, though, of brickwork and white rendering. Both the Chester cinemas I featured a while back have features in common with this.

Here’s a picture of The Playhouse on flickr. And another.

This is just down from Perth Museum And Art Gallery (which is worth a visit by the way.) It was probably originally a mill building. It runs along Mill Street, anyway. This side is clearly Deco.

As is this side as far as the third windows along. Note the flagpole.

No idea what this last one, on South Street, used to be. It’s a Co-operative Travel shop now, obviously.