Birmingham Skin Hospital - John Bright Street

Opened in 1888 – following transfer of facilities from Newhall Street which began operating in 1881 – the Birmingham and Midland Hospital for Skin and Urinary Diseases operated from its John Bright Street base for nearly 100 years before its work was transferred to George Road Edgbaston and is now part of the Dudley Road ‘City’ Hospital group.

The hospital, as the name suggests, concerned itself with all manner of skin ailments and diseases and operated both an in and out-patient department from the site which was purpose built to house the hospital for the princely sum of £5,000!

Interestingly, the entrance for woman and children was via John Bright Street – as seen above – whilst the entrance for male patients was via the rear of the building on Beak Street (see below) – presumably to save them the embarrassment of being seen entering through the main entrance by women and children due to the moral incorrigibility of more ‘urinary’ related issues!  For in-patients, the ward originally held 21 beds and there wee also medicated bathing facilities to be found in the basement of the building.

With the move to consolidate specialisms within large, multi-disciplinary hospitals – and due to the building itself not being suitable for the modern hospital – closure came during the early 1980s and the building lay derelict for several years.

Whilst working at Edward’s Number 8 nightclub, which adjoined the hospital, in the late-1980s the building was acquired by either Edward Fewtrell or Ansell’s Leisure shortly after their takeover (I can’t precisely recall) and we had keys to the building as it was being used to store a few bits and pieces from the nightclubs and bars.  Naturally, we spent many hours exploring the old hospital which was left in remarkably good condition inside with a lot of fittings and furniture still in place, along with signage etc.

Our greatest find – whilst mooching around in  the dark in the basement area – was a wooden hand cart that was shaped like a coffin:  no idea how old that was as I presume it had been ‘retired’ to the basement many years prior to the hospitals closure . . . at least one would hope so!

Some time later the building was opened as The Hospital – another bar in the by-then rapidly declining John Bright Street bar/club area, killed-off by competition from Broad Street, pedestrianisation and the moving of major bus termini to more central points in the City – which ran for a relatively short period before closure.

Whilst apparently not a listed structure, it is still standing and, externally at least, in pristine condition as the photographs here show.  I am unaware as to any function served by the building itself and assume it is vacant as no external signage indicates otherwise but sitting,a s it does, in one of the City’s development areas I would posit its conversion to offices imminent.

Futurist Cinema - John Bright Street

Work began in 1914 on the then to be named Majestic Theatre which opened some two years later in 1916 only to change its name to The Futurist Theatre some three years later in 1919. Always trying to be at the forefront of the cinematic medium, the Futurist was the first cinema in Birmingham to have curtains and to screen ‘talkies’ so always did its best to live up to its name.

In later years, being at the heart of the nightclub district of Birmingham and practically next door to the Alexandra Theatre meant a fair footfall of would be customers for the cinema.  However, during the 1990s the area began to go into decline and with the rise of multi-screen cinemas opening elsewhere – a trend to which the building could not bow – Cannon, who by this time operated the cinema, decided time was to be called during the mid-1990s and the building lay abandoned for several years.

The building itself – possibly the most aesthetically appealing left on John Bright Street in its original state – became the DNA dance club at the close of the 1990s which limped on into the early 2000s when the Spearmint Rhino chain took over the building as their ‘Club Rouge’ gentleman’s club.

Personally, I quite liked the cinema and saw Life of Brian shown with Airplane there many years ago and it’s a shame that it is now, well, what it is but at least it hasn’t been demolished . . . or caught fire – a fate that seems to have befallen many a building around that part of the City’s regeneration zone!

Abigail's Dining & Cabaret Club - John Bright Street

On the back of the runaway successes of the Bermuda Club, Cedar Club, Barbarella’s and Rebecca’s – Birmingham nightclub pioneer Edward Fewtrell identified a niche in the market for an upmarket dining and cabaret club in the City catering for the more affluent residents of and visitors to Birmingham.  He identified the run-down Savoy Hotel & Banqueting Suite (built in a former World War II bomb crater itself the site of the Deer’s Leap public house) and purchased it in 1974, naming it after his youngest daughter Abigail.

The completely refurbished club attracted big names to both perform and dine there – such as Tom Jones – and featured valet parking . . . an idea way ahead of its time in Birmingham and something I recall watching as a child:  people pulling up at the door, getting out of their car and going inside and someone else jumping in their car and driving off in it . . . seemed odd to me then!

Unfortunately, the demand for such a high-class venue was not what had been anticipated and the club struggled to keep afloat following its initial burst onto the scene and so, in 1978, it was sold to Ladbroke’s who turned it into a Casino – a function the building still serves today. Above can be seen the building today with John Bright Street to the right and Hill Street to the left.

Boogie's Brasserie - John Bright Street

Opened by Edward Fewtrell in 1966 as Rebecca’s – named after his eldest daughter – the premises operated along similar lines to later opened Edward’s Number 7 and Edward’s Number 8 bar and nightclub which were housed in an adjacent building in opening in 1979.  On the ground floor accessed from John Bright Street was Rebecca’s Brasserie, and to the rear, accessed from Lower Severn Street, was the nightclub part of the venue which occupied the upper floors (if my memory serves me correctly Edward Fewtrell’s office was on the very top floor) and was originally divided into the Cabasa, the Blue Soul and the Sin Bin.

The view above shows the ‘Geoffrey Buildings’ that housed the venue on the now pedestrianised John Bright Street – which was once a main thoroughfare with both the number 45 and 47 bus routes having their termini opposite the front of the club – with Lower Severn Street running off to the left of the shot.

In later years the club and bar ware renamed Boogies and Boogie’s Brasserie (the only bar where I’ve ever witenessed a mounted policeman entering a premises still on horseback during a particularly lively disagreement with ‘the Zulus’ during the mid 1980s!), respectively, and were – certainly during the early to mid-1980s – always packed and a popular haunt being as it was at the time, in the epicentre of club life in Birmingham.  I’m sure anyone who frequented Boogies will recall Norman ‘Nobby’ Nobbs lurking outside the entrance drumming up business in his inimitable ‘market trader’ style and harassing the queuing minions with his banter!

Sadly, as with the rest of Edward Fewtrell’s clubs, Ansell’s Leisure bought Boogies in 1989 and renamed it Orleans and the nightclub part befell a fire which gutted the premises leading to its partial demolition and rebuilding more in keeping with the Westside Development Scheme . . . which was a stroke of luck for the impending development!

Edward's Number 7 - John Bright Street

Pre-Broad Street ‘Golden Mile’, John Bright Street was one of the places, if not THE place, to be for for a night out in Birmingham City Centre.  Originally opening in 1979, Edward’s Number 7 bar and Edward’s Number 8 nightclub above it were the 7th and 8th clubs/bars to be opened by Birmingham club impresario Edward Fewtrell – hence their names – and marked a concentration of his clubs/bars in one area with Abigail’s and Rebecca’s also on John Bright Street and later Gowldwyns and Paramount just around the corner.

The ‘bar’ element comprising Number 7’s occupied the bottom two floors of the building and was located at the frontage onto John Bright Street with the entrance on the corner of that and Lower Severn Street as seen above.  The Number 8’s nightclub – also occupying two floors – was accessed via an entrance on Lower Severn Street at its corner with Beak Street  – to the extreme right of the above shot.

Whilst initially a reasonably successful club and bar, Number 8’s began to flag and in 1987 became a Rock club (Edward’s Rock Complex) catering for the City’s heavy metal/hard rock fraternity and became a phenomenal success and also opened itself up for gigs by rock bands and hosted some soon to be huge groups such as Faith No More.

Unfortunately, Ansell’s Leisure bought the premises from Mr Fewtrell in 1989 and rather ruined what had been a successful club.  They also changed Number 7’s from two floors to one and renamed it Bizzy Lizzies – for some reason better known to themselves.  However, with newer, more exciting and more heavily invested-in venues springing up elsewhere – particularly around Broad Street – John Bright Street began to lose its appeal and with it the old Number 7s began to fade away.

In November of 2006 a fire completely gutted the building (a similar thing happened to Boogies Nightclub too when that part of John Bright Street was earmarked for redevelopment oddly enough) and what remains today – as seen above and below – is a new building built within the facade preserved from the original structure.  Whilst ‘Eddie’s Rock Club’ lives on in name only at a nearby venue – the original is well and truly no more.  The Westside Two development Scheme that encompasses John Bright Street has now ensured that, some may argue, pointless office blocks prevail in the area and that the night life has long since left the buildings!

For my personal recollections of Edward’s Number 8 as a rock club, please see my Edward’s No.8 Night Club – The Rock Complex Remembered article.

Paramount - Suffolk Place

Opened by Edward Fewtrell a year before selling-up to Ansell’s Leisure, Paramount was a single-room bar around the corner from Edward’s and Boogies in the heart of the John Bright Street nightclub and bar scene of the 1980s.

Subject to an intervention from Paramount Studios over the name, the bar proved quite a popular venue on a Friday and Satruday night and the empty warehouse above it was cleared and turned into Goldwyn’s nightclub a year after opening.

The photograph above shows the the building that housed both Goldwyn’s and Paramount:  the entrance to the former being where the black roller shutter us seen to the left and the Paramount entrance to the right of the building on the corner of Suffolk Place and Beak Street with the DJ console being immediately to the right as you entered – the bar being ahead down a short flight of stairs and along the left of the venue.

I never had much involvement with Paramount at all during my time working for Mr Fewtrell and Ansell’s Leisure so haven’t got anything of interest to add.  All I recall was that the manageress was called Vanessa during the late 1980s!