It’s official: two legendary London cinemas will close this summer

Picturehouse has announced that it will be closing two of its cinemas in London this summer.

Bromley Picturehouse will be putting the shutters up on August 1, while the famous Fulham Road Picturehouse will be closing its doors on July 12.

Both signal a major loss to London’s cinema scene. The Fulham Road venue has been home to a cinema since the 1930s and received a glitzy 1930s-style renovation when it switched from Cineworld to Picturehouse in 2019. The site was sold to developers last month and will be replaced with flats. 

The Bromley cinema first opened as an Oscar Deutsch Odeon Theatres in 1936. Since then it has been run by Empire Cinemas, Cineworld and, since 2019, a Picturehouse.  

The news comes after Picturehouse’s owners, Cineworld, announced plans to restructure its UK business. The cinema runs more than a hundred sites in the country. 

As Time Out reported last year, the post-pandemic slowdown in moviegoing has been impacting cinemas of all sizes across the country. Multi-screen venues and multiplexes have been particularly exposed, although the blockbuster success of ‘Inside Out 2’ (£23 million in UK box office to date) is cause for optimism.

And in more positive news for London film lovers, Walthamstow’s old Empire cinema will be reopening as Forest Cinemas later in 2024.

Picturehouse continues to run multiple cinemas across the capital, including its flagship, Picturehouse Central, the Ritzy in Brixton, and the new Ealing Picturehouse. 

It’s official: Walthamstow is getting its only cinema back.

Londoners’ 25 favourite cinemas in the capital.