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Edinburgh Live
Edinburgh Live
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David McLean

Nine former Edinburgh cinema venues that survived demolition and found a new lease of life

With more than a dozen to choose from, Edinburgh in 2022 isn’t exactly short of cinemas.

Big name multiplexes serve the outskirts and centre of the capital, while a bunch of smaller cinemas and home-grown independent screens, such as the Dominion and Cameo, are peppered throughout the rest of the city.

But it’s nothing compared to yesteryear.

READ MORE: The grandiose lost Edinburgh cinema that you've probably never heard of

The number of venues on offer today is positively dwarfed by the incredible picture house coverage enjoyed in generations past.

Edinburgh's first cinemas tended to open within existing buildings, but as more and more people flocked to the pictures, an array of purpose-built 'temples' began to appear and, by the 1930s, cinemas were ubiquitous.

They had swanky and exotic names like Roxy, Tivoli and Alhambra, and boasted lavish and inventive interiors that whisked punters off to far flung places - much like the films they were about to watch.

Venues such as the New Victoria in Clerk Street, the State Cinema in Leith's Great Junction Street and the County Cinema in Portobello were designed in a distinctive style we now term art deco.

Certain Edinburgh postcodes boasted multiple places to watch the latest films and locals were seldom further than half a mile from the nearest venue.

Naturally, as the century wore on, with TV sets, and, later, home video, becoming affordable, the number of cinemas on offer steadily decreased.

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From the 1960s onwards, many Edinburgh cinemas were demolished altogether and new uses were found for those that survived.

We take a look at 10 former cinema venues around the capital, which may not have shown a film in decades, but are thankfully still with us.

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