Cambridge Theatre

Details

CAMDEN

TQ3081SW EARLHAM STREET
798-1/105/355 (South side)
Cambridge Theatre

GV II

Theatre on a corner site facing Seven Dials with returns to
Mercer Street and Shelton Street. 1929-30. By Wimperis,
Simpson and Guthrie; interior partly by Serge Chermayeff,
friezes by Anthony Gibbons Grinling. Portland stone to front,
brick to rear.
EXTERIOR: 5 storeys. Entrance on chamfered corner with 3 main
round-arched doorways under a projecting plain canopy; further
openings, round-arched to Earlham Street and flat arched to
Mercer Street. Upper floors on corner have plain metal framed
windows to each face, the 4th floor forming a balcony of
distyle-in-antis piers with a similar window to the rear and
rising above the cornice. Returns have similar windows but at
1st floor alternate windows have cornices; Mercer Street with
pilaster architraved round-arched window and lugged stone
balcony. Brick portion has mostly small metal-framed windows
and a large entrance for scenery.
INTERIOR: retains original features including lighting
sequence. Circular entrance foyer with bronze frieze depicting
nudes in exercise poses. Main foyer has similar panels of
dancing nudes, walls partly of fictive marble with uplighters
on pilasters, a multi-layer ceiling, with diamond patterned
edges, for concealed lighting; chandeliers; stair has chrome
handrails. Bar in similar style. Corridor has barrel-vaulted
corrugated ceiling uplit from coved cornice; main doors brass
clad with etched moderne design of zig-zag pattern threaded
with undulations, small paned windows and plain double strip
pushers. Auditorium fan-shaped sweeping up unbroken to the
elliptical form of the ceiling which is arranged in broad
concentric bands for lighting. 2-tier balcony with moderne
triangular patterned balustrade which continues at 1st tier
level to front 2 bow-fronted boxes; to right of stage with
panel of schematic sun and buildings, to left, sun and waves.
Uplighters, 2 with crystal fountain effect chandeliers. Tall
fictive marble dado to stalls; moulded proscenium.
HISTORICAL NOTE: the Cambridge Theatre is a rare, complete and
early example of a London theatre adopting the moderne,
expressionist style pioneered in Germany during the 1920s. It
marked a conscious reaction to the design excesses of the
music hall and contemporary cinemas. Theatres looked for a new
style appropriate to the greater sophistication of their


entertainment and found it in the Germanic moderne forms of
simple shapes enlivened by concealed lighting, shiny steelwork
and touches of bright colour; this was not taken up by cinema
designers until 1935. At the time of designing Chermayeff was
an interior designer with Waring & Gillow; the original colour
scheme was dusky pink contrasted with pale blue and silver.

Listing NGR: TQ3010881062

Legacy

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Legacy System number:

477155

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LBS

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