Cinema De Luxe

An allotment half way up Bexhill-on-sea’s Western Road, called the Cabbage Patch was cleared in November 1912, to make way for the towns third cinema and the second to be purpose built.

Five months and £3,500 later and the Cinema De Luxe was ready to welcome 625 patrons in the latest tip-up seating. The projection box was fitted with two Butchers Empire projectors at a cost of £100 each and according to the Bexhill on Sea Observer; “had lamps that gave the same light as 4,000 candles”. It was known to locals as the ‘Cabbage Patch Cinema’.

The first owners were the Bexhill Cinematograph Company, who opened the cinema on Wednesday, 19 March, 1913, with it screened, “Captain Scott to the Pole”. The cinema was a huge success and was eventually acquired by the Richards family, who later called their chain Kinema Playhouses Limited. In time a larger capacity was needed and the owners decided to build a second cinema on some adjacent land in Western Road.

The new Picture Playhouse (later Classic/Curzon/Redstack) opened in July 1921 but rather than assist the Cinema De Luxe, it all but killed it off.

The original cinema struggled on for a few months when the painful decision had to be taken to close it down. The final film at the Cinema De Luxe was the Petrolini film, “While the World Laughs”, on Saturday, 26th November, 1921.

For a few months after it’s closure, the Cinema De Luxe was offered for function hire but during 1922 it became a garage and petrol station and over the years it has been owned by the Bexhill-on-sea Observer and been an Indoor Market. It became derelict and, like the larger cinema next door, was awaiting transformation into a Wethersooons public house called The Playhouse. The Cinema De Luxe part will have a roof garden. The Playhouse pub opened in July 2017.

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