Eastbourne UK bandstand and pleasure pier

entertainment facilities on Eastbourne Pier

Like other coastal towns, Eastbourne began to grow rapidly as the medicinal and leisure benefits of sea air and sea bathing became well known. Locals scrambled to provide a wide variety of facilities and amusements for the thousands who flocked to Eastbourne each summer. My favourite would have been Devonshire Park which was first designed in 1874 with terraces, walks and a cricket ground. As the money flowed in, the owners added tennis courts and a roller skating rink. Very sensibly they located Devonshire Park next to the baths, the Winter Gardens and the Theatre. 

In this post, I am interested in publicly funded facilities. There were many pleasure piers built around the coastal resort towns of Britain, and then in other countries. The earliest was probably Ryde’s on the Isle of Wight (1813) although the majority did not start until the late C19th. Early pleasure piers were made of wood; iron structures only became more popular with the construction in 1855 of Margate Jetty. The National Piers Society suggests that only 55 seaside piers survive today in England and Wales, the oldest extant iron pier being in Southport (1860).

Eastbourne's pier was designed by Eugenius Birch in 1865 and built by the Eastbourne Pier Company for £15,000. Originally a landing stage for steamers, it soon became a "pleasure pier" because it enabled the gentry to walk over the water and to participate in the social life there.

Spouse and I loved the pier when we first lived in Britain. But decades later it was starting to look just a little bit old fashioned. The only innovation that I remember was The Victorian Tea Rooms which  specialised in Sussex Cream Tea and attractive table settings.

Agatha Christie's story, The Jewel Robbery at the Grand Metropolitan, was set in Brighton but partially filmed in Eastbourne. Just as well the film was finished in 1993. Firstly the owners put Eastbourne Pier up for sale in 2009; included were Victorian tea rooms, an amusement arcade, bars and a nightclub. Secondly Eastbourne Pier experienced a fire in July 2014 that burned through a large amount of the central domed building. The two-thirds of the 305-metre pier that were not destroyed ...were quickly reopened.

Even more popular than pleasure piers, re leisure time activities, were the bandstands built in the UK, Australia and other countries in the world. Presumably they too resulted from changing social life in late Victorian & Edwardian years.

Normally bandstands were built in the centre of a public park, surrounded by lawns & gardens where families strolled or sat on portable chairs. The old practice of military bands marching through built up areas in town, surrounded by scruffy children and hangers-on, was no longer acceptable.

Each coastal town sought to unify the pleasure activities in the centre of the town’s beach area. Many towns liked to choose from amusement arcades, theatres, restaurants, tea rooms, striped deck chairs, slot machines, lunar park rides, fishing sites, fairground stalls and walking areas. What was less common was a bandstand being located right next to a beach, very close to that coastal town’s pleasure pier.

Eastbourne bandstand, pleasure pier and beach

This East Sussex town had its bandstand by 1893, standing on cast iron stilts right on the seafront. Decades later, as a part of the town’s plan to improve its resort facilities, a newer Eastbourne Band stand went up. The 2nd bandstand, built in 1935, had a rather special semi-circular design, Orientalist blue domed roof and silver finial. Still today, see its main arena with middle and upper balconies seating 3,500 people.

Ten thousand people attended the three concerts given in that special summer of 1935.

For many years Eastbourne bandstand ran a daily programme of military bands, at least until the end of each summer season. But new audiences don’t necessarily love what their grandparents loved. So in 2010, the 75th anniversary of the new bandstand, big band nights, rock 'n' roll and Last Night of the Proms were added to the programme. The concert music ended triumphantly with Tchaikovsky’s 1812 overture, accompanied by a spectacular firework display.

Clearly the organisers are making the programme more relevant for modern audiences and the bandstand is having a new lease on life. Some 150 concerts are now held per year in Eastbourne (pop 90,000).

Eastbourne bandstand and concert

One last thought that I have raised before - a connection between bandstands and the Titanic. See a commemorative plaque at the rear of the original Eastbourne bandstand, in memory of a local  bands-man who was playing on the Titanic when it sank in April 1912. That plaque was transferred to the newer, 1935 bandstand.

I am referring readers to the book Eastbourne Bandstand, Oriental Sussex because, apart from anything else, I love the title.