Troxy

Troxy is a former cinema, originally built around 1931-1933 by George Coles for cinema entrepreneurs Phil and Sid Hyams and Major A J Gale. It has since been converted into a costume and scene painting studio. The building features a cream faience tile exterior that creates a channeled effect, with a return of yellow stock brick. Designed in the Art Deco style, it has a central two-storey opening with an enriched architrave and distyle in antis pillars that have stylized capitals. These pillars rise from the first floor level to support an enriched frieze.

Flanking the central opening are vertical glazing sections with delicately patterned strips and geometrically patterned head panels. There is a projecting canopy at the first floor level above the entrances, which include two original doors (though the glazing has been altered) and one entrance that is now blocked. The entrances on either side of the main ground floor opening have been altered, but above them are panels for posters, each topped by a pilaster with original flag poles that rise above a geometrically patterned frieze, dentil cornice, and blocking course.

Inside, the double-height foyer has been altered to include an inserted floor to create workshops, but it originally featured a first-floor café and balcony. Notable interior elements include a golden onyx stair with a central cast iron balustrade and a multi-coloured marble floor. The auditorium showcases rich Art Deco plasterwork on the walls, ceiling, and proscenium, with large panels of delicate ornamental grillwork and original lights on the side walls. A large, enriched three-tier ceiling fitting provides both illumination and air conditioning outlets, and the original balcony remains intact. The stage retains revolving circles, and a lift for the Wurlitzer organ is still present. The Troxy closed in 1960 and reopened in 1963 as a training school for the Covent Garden Opera.