Memorial Hall (Newbridge)

• Theatre ID
  1412
• Built / Converted
  1924
• Current state
  Extant
• Current use
  dark (closed as cinema/bingo in 1972)
• Address
  Celynen Collieries Workmen’s Institute & Memorial Hall, High Street, Newbridge, Gwent, NP11 4FH, Wales
• Website
  • http://www.newbridge-memo.net

Details

The Miners' Institute, which opened in 1908, is larger than most of its kind, originally housing a reading room, billiards room, library and other facilities. It is in a pleasing non-institutional architectural style, a two storey building in red and yellow brick with some stone dressings and hipped slated roofs. Alternate bays are gabled on both principal and side elevations and the left hand bay on the principal front is advanced. The Memorial Hall, added in 1924, is taller by a storey, plainer in treatment but in similar materials. The return elevations are in rubble stone. The hall has its own entrance, obscured by an unsympathetic modern addition. It contains a ballroom (still in use) at ground floor, with a disused cinema/theatre on the first floor. The theatre is an excellent and complete example of its kind and period. It has a segmental vaulted ceiling with ornamental ventilation grilles, oak dados, an end balcony and a rectangular proscenium flanked by splayed jambs with exit doors and decorative panels above. Side walls have semi-circular arched windows with ornamental shutters and fanlights. On the piers between the windows are painted roundels and panels, the paintings in the roundels being original. The stage has a false ceiling. In front is a wood balustrade to form an orchestra space. The projection room above the balcony still has two vintage projectors. This is an important auditorium. A newly formed Trust is planning its restoration.

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• Other names
  The Memo (popular name)
• Events
  • 1908 Design/Construction: Workmen’s Institute built
    • R L Roberts - Architect
  • 1924 Alteration: Memorial Hall added at rear
    • E D T Jenkins - Architect
  • 1950 Alteration: annexe built to join the buildings
    • Unknown - Architect
• Capacities
  • Current: est. 800
• Listings
  • Grade II - It appears from the list description that the investigator paid little regard to the Memorial Hall, but it is nevertheless listed as part of the larger whole
• Stage type
  • flat, pros
• Dimensions
  • Orchestra pit: none
• Latest news
  Runner up in the second BBC series of Restoration (July/August 2004)