Corn Exchange In the mid-19th century, a group of local businessmen formed a company, The Corn Exchange Company, to finance and erect a corn exchange for the town. The site they selected on Green Street had originally been a public bleaching green before being occupied by the local fish market. The ground floor of the Corn Exchange which looked towards Green Street consisted of a number of shops and also housed a public library on the upper floor of the building. The upper floor which faces towards London Road contained the Athenaeum reading room. The final cost for the construction of the Corn Exchange was estimated to be just over £6,000. The design involved an asymmetrical main frontage on the corner of London Road and Green Street. It featured a four-stage tower, known as the "Albert Tower", at the corner with wings of nine bays extending down London Road and of thirteen bays extending down Green Street. and it was therefore converted into a music hall in 1903. In the 1940s, extensive internal alterations were carried out to a design by Gabriel Steel to create the Grand Hall.
Cinema and theatre The first films were shown at the Corn Exchange as early as 1897, and by 1911, they were a regular feature of the programme of entertainment offered at the venue. By the 1930s, the venue had become used exclusively a cinema under the name Palace Picture House. A state- of-the-art sound system was installed in order for the new ‘talkies’ system to be used which saw a recording of the film soundtrack being played over a gramophone which was synchronised with the projector. Following
World War II, the Palace Picture House failed to compete with more modern and more comfortable cinemas in Kilmarnock, such as the Regal Cinema and the Plaza. As a result, it closed in 1949. The venue was vacant until a gift of £5,000 towards its refurbishment prompted the council to spend a further £30,000 in order to redevelop the venue and bring it back into public use. By 1951, the venue re–opened as the 625-seater Exchange Theatre, with Mr Kurt Lewenhak being appointed manager of the Exchange Theatre, at a salary of £650. Originally, The Exchange was intended to be a civic theatre that would feature programmes which would showcase local talent. Early shows included the Kilmarnock Amateur Opera Society's production of
Rio Rita, the Saxone Dramatic Club's production of Allan Ramsay's 1725 play
The Gentle Shepherd, Kilmarnock Combined Dramatic Clubs’ production of
Dear Brutus, and Henry Cotton's
Golf Show. The first major production was a variety show entitled
Merry-go-Round – ‘the show with a swing to it’ which opened on 20th June 1951, and ran for a total of eight weeks with regular changes of content. Despite a successful opening night, the show was deemed to be unsuccessful and saw the Exchange Theatre operating on a loss of an average of £372 a week. In 1979, the theatre was severely damaged by fire, and eventually re–opened to the public on 4 September 1982 following a programme of repairs costing £190,000, with a variety show for charity starring Johnny Beattie, Joe Gordon and Sally Logan. Following further improvements, the Palace was formally re-opened on 31 August 1985 by comedian
Billy Connolly. ==Cultural Kilmarnock project==