Southport Mecca Bingo – Lord Street

Southport’s Mecca occupied one of the country’s genuinely important lost theatre buildings, and bingo had been played there since 1963, decades before Mecca ever arrived. The Garrick Theatre opened in December 1932, designed by George E. Tonge with a capacity of around 1,600, replacing an earlier Opera House destroyed by fire in 1929. It was properly theatrical inside, with stalls, a circle, eight boxes and a 50-foot proscenium, plus a decorated ceiling originally painted in yellow, gold, green and black around the central chandelier. It hosted genuine star names in its day, including Julie Andrews and Laurel and Hardy, and its last major live show was, rather brilliantly, a 1957 production of Robin Hood on Ice. Essoldo Cinemas took the building over that same year, converting it for film use while keeping the stage intact, before bingo arrived in 1963, initially part-time under the Lucky 7 Bingo Club, before becoming full-time later that year.

The sequence continued through Top Rank Bingo before Mecca eventually took over, running the club under lease from 1999 to 2021. What makes Southport special is how much survived, with the balcony and much of the original theatral decoration still intact right through its bingo years, reduced from the original theatre capacity to around 1,200 seats. Former staff recalled the Garrick pulling in around 10,000 bingo players a week in summer, reflecting Southport’s role as a seaside resort with hotels, coach parties and holidaymakers all adding to the local bingo crowd. The club closed temporarily during the first Covid lockdown, briefly reopened in October 2020, then closed permanently in April 2021 following further restrictions, ending nearly 60 years of continuous bingo in the building. It’s Grade II listed and was sold in November 2021, but remains standing rather than demolished, and in February 2022 was added to the Theatre Trust’s Theatres at Risk list, a fitting reminder that beneath the old Mecca signage still sits a genuine 1932 theatre auditorium waiting for its next chapter.

Other Lost Halls In The Area

• Preston Empire Bingo – Church Street
• Preston Gala Bingo – Market Street
• Skelmersdale Seldon’s Bingo – The Concourse
• Blackpool Apollo Bingo – Waterloo Road
• Blackpool Mecca Bingo – Church Street
• Blackpool Empire Bingo – Hawes Side Lane

Provided exclusively for Playing Bingo by the artist duo Henry/Bragg who photographed several UK bingo halls as part of their B.I.N.G.O project, this set shows a well preserved venue. The design theme of the interior has a bold use of shapes in the structure and decoration and steers away from the elaboration of some of the theatre designs of the era. The shape of the interior is ‘framed’ by lines both on the ceiling and the walls. Little has been altered in the building except for the inevitable use of ‘Mecca carpets’, as there is only so much carpet restoration you can do, so they are usually the first aspect of a venue to change. It’s good to see that the boxes are still in use and that overall everything appears to be in a great state of repair. The exterior is not one of the most impressive to be seen, but, in its day it was probably well lit at night.

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