Mecca Bingo Club
MECCA BINGO CLUB, ALBEMARLE CRESCENT
Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places
Overview
- Heritage Category:
- Listed Building
- Grade:
- II
- List Entry Number:
- 1384984
- Date first listed:
- 05-Oct-2000
- List Entry Name:
- Mecca Bingo Club
- Statutory Address:
- MECCA BINGO CLUB, ALBEMARLE CRESCENT
Location
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Images of England Project
- Date:
- 2007-09-19
- Reference:
- IOE01/16990/07
- Rights:
- © Lorna Freeman. Source: Historic England Archive
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Discover moreOfficial list entry
- Heritage Category:
- Listed Building
- Grade:
- II
- List Entry Number:
- 1384984
- Date first listed:
- 05-Oct-2000
- List Entry Name:
- Mecca Bingo Club
- Statutory Address 1:
- MECCA BINGO CLUB, ALBEMARLE CRESCENT
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.
Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.
For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.
Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.
For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.
Location
- Statutory Address:
- MECCA BINGO CLUB, ALBEMARLE CRESCENT
The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.
- District:
- North Yorkshire (Unitary Authority)
- Parish:
- Scarborough
- National Grid Reference:
- TA 04017 88490
Details
SCARBOROUGH
TA0488 ALBEMARLE CRESCENT
782/4/10019 Scarborough
05-OCT-00 Mecca Bingo Club
GV II
Also Known As: Capitol Cinema, ALBEMARLE CRESCENT, Scarborough
Former Capitol cinema, constructed in 1928-29 for Londesborough Theatre and Picture House (Scarborough) Ltd. Architects: Gray and Evans of Liverpool (job architect: Edwin Sheridan Evans). White faience facade, with return and rear walls in stock brick, to steel frame. Roof not seen. Cinema auditorium with single balcony, undivided, behind shallow foyer.
EXTERIOR: Symmetrical facade in white faience, standing on a low painted plinth, which has to rise in order to compensate for the steep gradient. The main entrance is beneath a canopy and is flanked by two subsidiary entrances and two exit apertures enclosed by heavy mouldings and large keystones. Three tall central windows are set in a slightly protruding area under an enriched straight pediment with a cove cornice, surmounted by an oval cartouche. There are side wings with shallow aedicules having flat=pitched pediments, above which are panels of Rinceau ornament. This decoration continues as a frieze along the top of the central block to flank original lettering thus: CAPITOL. There are smaller vertical windows, surmounted by wreaths, set between the central block and the aedicules.
INTERIOR: A foyer leads to the large double-height auditorium. It has a rusticated coved proscenium and a canted ante-proscenium - the return bays facing back into the body of the auditorium. The ante-proscenium bays contain `Neo-Grec' grilles behind which were the organ chambers, while above, arches extend forward becoming pointed hoods. Over the proscenium is a frieze of winged beasts with human heads supporting ribbon wreaths and flanked by Rinceau ornament. There is a dado rail with more Rinceau panels, incorporating masks. The side walls are treated as a heavily moulded arcade with false balconies containing spiky lozenge ornamentation of almost Gothic character. The arches are surmounted by mask keystones. The pilasters have capitals incorporating three rosettes each. Dentil cornice. Plain barrel ceiling. There is a large balcony with a central vomitory entrance. Shallow cin?-variety' stage.
ANALYSIS: A large super-cinema dating from the years immediately before the introduction of sound films in the late 1920s (the Capitol was wired for sound' in the last months of 1929), in which the elaborate classical decorative detail has survived virtually intact. Bingo took over permanently in 1977.
SOURCES:
Brian Hornsey, Ninety Years of Cinema in Scarborough, Fuchsiaprint, Stamford, Lincolnshire 1995, pages 10, 12, 13-16.
Richard Gray, Cinemas in Britain, Lund Humphries, London 1996, page 140.
Listing NGR: TA0401788490
Legacy
The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.
- Legacy System number:
- 485443
- Legacy System:
- LBS
Sources
Books and journals
Hornsey, B, Ninety Years of Cinema in Scarborough, (1995), 10 12 13-6
Gray, R, Cinemas in Britain: One Hundred Years of Cinema Architecture, (1996), 140
Legal
This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.
Map
This map is for quick reference purposes only and may not be to scale. This copy shows the entry on 17-Jun-2026 at 03:03:57.
Download a full scale map (PDF)End of official list entry
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