<Site History>
To the south west of the site a building known as Amity Hall can be seen. This building was previously a theatre and became Poole's first cinema in around 1896 (photo right, middle). It remained a cinema for 60 years on this site.
The proposed scheme acknowledges this history by locating the arts cinema in this part of the site.
The proposals seek to open up this junction of the high street and make it a focus again. The early photograph shown bottom, centre (pre-Amity Hall) shows this part of the high street was a key focus of activity. We wish to rekindle this focus by opening the scheme up to the high street with the expansive cinema frontage and the open covered market.
<Historic Architectural influences>
Poole has a rich industrial past particularly through the nineteenth century and remained so up until the mid twentieth century. The skyline was dotted with a series of chimneys and industrial buildings. More recently some of these structures such as old grain silos on Poole quay, the Poole power station and Poole pottery were all iconic industrial buildings with prominent chimney structures.
We have reimagined the architecture of these great brick structures through the design of a look out tower at the centre of the. This will also provide a focus for the development and make it visible from either end of the high street thus creating a marker or attractor that will help orientate people in the town centre.
