ABC Cinema
The 2600 seat Savoy Cinema-Theatre, designed by F. C. Mitchell (Savoy Cinemas’ architect), opened in 1930 on the oddly shaped plot left by Brill’s Baths. The largest cinema ever built in Brighton is now home to five different nightlife venues. So what’s the story?
Lamprell’s, the first communal swimming-bath in Brighton opened in 1823 on East Street by a Mr Lamprell in a circular domed building nicknamed ‘the bunion’. In the 1840s, Charles Brill (Lamprell’s nephew) inherited the baths and in 1961 he opened a new ladies’ seawater bath in a nearby Gothic building on the west side of Pool Valley. In 1869, he built a new gentlemen’s bath, designed by Sir George Gilbert Scott, in a red-brick building between East Street and Pool Valley. The circular pool was the largest in Europe at that time and its seawater was brought in from Hove – which, as Hove residents know is far cleaner! Brill’s baths were demolished 1929 but look out for the tiny Brill’s Lane between East Street and Grand Junction Road.
Today, the seafront entrance and upper parts are used by the Grosvenor Casino and the grand East Street entrance is now the doorway to a bar called ‘Toad’. Three other bars occupy the rest of the building, namely KooKlub, Santa Fe and Po Na Na. Call me old fashioned, but I’d have the 1930s atmosphere back at the drop of a hat.
