Motion Picture Herald (Sep-Oct 1939)

View of the foyer with its walls in three shades of Vitrolite. crowd, and the lounges and toilet rooms for both sexes are directly accessible from it. The foyer floor is covered with a Crestwood Velvet carpet having a modern pattern giving a bubble effect in maroon, rust, tan and gold shades, which shades harmonize with the tones of the plaster walls and ceiling. The business office and the heating and airconditioning machinery room, as well as the projection room, are on the second floor and are reached by means of an ornamental wrought iron stairway from the foyer. The toilet rooms have marble tile floors and painted walls and ceilings. The women's quarters include a lounge with plaster walls in old rose, ceiling in off-white, and carpeting of a Wilton weave in a modern straight-line pattern in black and gold on a blue ground. The furniture is of stainless steel. The Auditorium The auditorium, which has no balcony, seats 800. It is approximately 52 feet wide and 90 feet long. There are four exits from the auditorium leading out on to well paved, lighted sidewalks — they make it possible to empty the house forward and avoid the confusion of mixing the outgoing with the incoming patrons and therefore to get a quick turnover between shows. The side walls of the auditorium are untinted acoustic plaster above a dado of brown hard plaster edged with three bands of walnut. Spaced along the upper part on each side are three large sunbursts which have red central figures illuminated by concealed lamps in bracket fixtures. A stepped cornice runs all along the ceiling, blending the gray of the walls with the cream color of the ceiling. The ceiling, finished in hard plaster, is flat except for a center plaque, or rib, running the full length of the room and con Charles W. Hiehle, son of R. J. Hiehle, who manages the new neighborhood Burwell, while his father handles downtown Hiehle theatre. cealing the air outlets as well as acting as an air diffuser. This is painted deep red underneath, and in addition to this and red of the sunbursts, red is the color of the velour seating upholstery (which has a pin stripe in gold) and also appears in the carpeting, which is of the same pattern and coloration as that in the foyer. The sidewall indirect bracket fixtures supply all of the auditorium illumination ; the circuits are controlled by dimmer. The chairs have springedge seats and padded backs ; most of them are 20 inches wide, while row spacing is 36 inches, which today must be considered as not too much if we are to provide the comfort and convenience that the public has come to associate with motion pictures and expects as a matter of course in any well-appointed, modern theatre. We provide clean, filtered air which is cooled in summer with water from our own well, which may be lowered in temperature as necessary by means of a Carrier compressor. The well can give about 70 gallons per minute. Heating is by hot air ; the fuel used by the heating plant is natural gas. Soil conditions were such that a basement was inadvisable, so Ave placed the machinery and heating plant on the second floor together with the projection room and the business office. The building was erected by Mr. Nelson Burwell, who did his own contracting and superintending of the job. Accordingly, the cost of the entire outlay comes to about $75,000, fully equipped. The front, finished in white stucco with trim in black enameled brick. 8 A Section of Motion Picture Herald