The Forum

The Forum is a cinema, later adapted for use as a concert hall, built in 1934. It was designed by J Stanley Beard and WR Bennett. The building has a steel frame clad in brick with a faience front. The design incorporates a double-height auditorium with a balcony, accessed via a single-storey entrance hall and foyers.

The external appearance is three storeys, with seven bays, and is in an Egyptian style. Later 20th-century doors are set within the black faience ground floor. Decorative metal glazing is featured in the windows, with those within the five-bay central section separated by a giant order of six half-columns with streamlined acanthus capitals. A heavy moulded parapet and cornice extend across the flanking towers of the outer bays.

The foyer features a foliate cornice and fluted capitals to the piers. The upper foyer has Pompeian-style capitals to the piers, a Victorian scroll cornice, decorative metal panels flanking doorways to the circle, and a cigar-shaped ceiling. A rare surviving front tearoom is accessible from the foyer and contains panelling, moulded plasterwork and decorative iron grilles. The auditorium, designed in a Roman style, includes a heavily fluted proscenium arch and flanking side walls with shields and banners in the spandrels. The fluted side walls incorporate grilles decorated in a Roman style with urns (which were damaged at the time of listing), and legionary standards with Roman medallions and eagles. The remaining side walls are adorned with friezes of centurions and chariots. The ceiling features a central dome surrounded by coffering, with original circular light brackets and ventilators. The building includes panelled exit doors, and later 20th-century stairs, in a matching style, lead from the stalls to the balcony.