Description

This list entry was subject to a Minor Enhancement on 29 April 2022 to amend the description and to reformat the text to current standards.

SD 5805 SW
24-1/8/25

WIGAN
KING STREET (north east side),
Nos. 48 AND 50, Former Royal Court Theatre

(Formerly Listed as: KING STREET (North East side) Nos. 48 AND 50 (The Royal Court Theatre))

10/03/98

GV

II
Theatre, subsequently cinema, bingo hall when surveyed. 1886 and 1895, by RT Johnson; altered. Red brick in English garden wall bond with dressings of matching red terracotta and some yellow brick (roof concealed but probably slate). Large rectangular plan at right-angles to street. Eclectic style, with some Renaissance detailing.

EXTERIOR: three storeys and five bays, with two storey projected foyer (added 1895): this has fluted pilasters to both floors (Ionic at first floor but partially concealed at ground floor by C20 fascia), a continuous dentilled cornice and geometrical cast-iron balustrade; at ground floor, a round-headed doorway in the centre with banded pilasters, flanked by recessed entrances with wooden panelled and plate-glass doors, and shop windows in the outer bays; at first floor, a window in the centre with leaded stained glass and an elaborate broken-pedimented architrave with an oculus immediately above set in a swan-necked architrave, and large depressed-arched six-light transomed windows in the other bays with moulded terracotta surrounds and leaded stained glass in the upper lights. Above and behind is the gabled end of the main range, which has four round-headed windows with mask keystones of red terracotta, an egg-and-dart frieze, a round-headed window in the gable flanked by sunk panels with raised lettering "ROYAL COURT" "THEATRE"; and stepped gable coping with a flaming-urn finial, flanked by yellow terracotta balustrading over the outer bays.

INTERIOR: foyer with a pair of composite columns flanking the foot of an imperial staircase with brass handrail; auditorium with two curved balconies, the first with Adam-style moulded plaster decoration (the upper now enclosed); side walls with large pictorial relief panels flanking the proscenium; proscenium arch with moulded plaster enrichment, the top now concealed by suspended ceiling; upper gallery now disused but retains steeply-raked stepped floor (and inserted projection room in centre), and visible from it the top of the proscenium arch with moulded plaster pictorial scene and figures over it, and very large circular gilded ceiling dome. Despite some alteration firstly as cinema and latterly as bingo hall, still essentially intact.

HISTORICAL NOTE: Richardson Thomas Johnson (1848 to 1929) was born in London. His father William was from Wigan, but in 1851 was working as an engine maker in Lambeth. The family returned to Wigan where William became landlord of the Hole ith Wall (hole in the wall) pub off Market Place. Richardson was a boarding pupil at Well Hall school in Clitheroe. By 1869 Richardson was practising from Wallgate as a ‘land, building and engineering surveyor’, although still living with his parents in 1871. His first notable building seems to have been the arcade further up King Street which later became known as Grime's arcade (1871, National Heritage List for England – NHLE - entry 1384479). In 1874 he built the Alexandra Music Hall for his father as a replacement for the pub. After designing the Royal Court Theatre he redesigned the Theatre Royal opposite (1890, demolished) and in 1892 redesigned the Alexandra as the Empire Palace theatre (demolished). He remained in Wigan until the end of the C19 but also had connections in Dewsbury, where two of his children were born. By 1901 he was practising in Blackpool. He later moved to live with his daughter’s family in Liverpool, and died there.

Listing NGR: SD5832705476

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q26664318

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

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