The Gielgud Theatre

The Gielgud Theatre, formerly known as the Globe Theatre, is a theatre dating from 1902, designed by W. G. R. Sprague. It is constructed of Portland stone with a slate roof and is in a Free Baroque style incorporating French design influences. The theatre occupies a corner site and was originally conceived as part of a symmetrical composition with the Queen's Theatre, sharing similar plans and elevations. The building is four storeys high, with two windows wide facing Shaftesbury Avenue, a three-window-wide bowed corner, and a three-window return to Rupert Street, which continues as a plain brick and stone facade. Foyer doorways are situated on the corner beneath a canopy supported by ornamental brackets. The windows have enriched architraves and cornices to the first and second floors, and oeil de boeuf windows to the third floor, topped by a crowning cornice and balustrade. The bowed corner is slightly recessed, featuring arcaded first-floor windows and a giant Ionic order connecting the second and third floors. Above the main cornice, the bow develops into a short, buttressed, circular tower with a stone dome.

The interior is well decorated, including a spacious circular foyer with Ionic columns. The auditorium is circular, shaped by the tangent of the proscenium wall, and features two cantilevered balconies. Curved side walls, at both balcony levels, are adorned with pairs of engaged Ionic columns supporting entablatures, a design motif repeated in the Grand Saloon behind the Dress Circle. Pairs of giant, pedestalled Corinthian pilasters flank the stage, framing two tiers of boxes and carrying an entablature across the proscenium architrave. The circular moulded ceiling has a central crystal electrolier. The original stage machinery remains, including a bridge of its original form, a grave trap, two single traps, elements of the stage grid with a bridge winch and slider mechanisms, and other related features. Sprague collaborated with Frank Matcham.