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We invite you to name a seat in our refurbished auditorium and secure your place in history.

Naming a seat means your message will be displayed for a period of ten years with perhaps your company name, a celebration or commemoration, or simply a dedication to a loved one.

Flexible payments are available with prices starting at just £6 per month

Wall-mounted plaques are also available for the Circle Boxes

Sadly we are unable to process applications online so for further information, please click on the above image to download and print your forms from our main website

See our Facebook gallery link below to view a representative sample and click the images for date information etc.

1880 City Varieties Logo with link to gallery

Staff before the race

L-R

Alex Dalton, Learning Assistant
Diane Ollier, PA to Andrew Macgill
Amy Dutton, Head of Communications
Kirsty Lodge, Marketing Officer
Andrew Macgill, Theatre and Events Director

Bright and early on Sunday 4 July, a small but determined group met up in the Tiled Hall, nervously adjusting safety pins and swigging back water amongst a crowd of what looked like quite sophisticated and prepared runners. Some of us, I’m sure were questioning why this had seemed like a good idea back in March, when we’d all agreed to sign up for the Jane Tomlinson 10k to help raise money for the City Varieties refurbishment, however, with donations promised, there was no turning back now. What we hadn’t realised was that our VIP passes to the Tiled Hall (we were all there for the tea really) that Andrew had got us, actually meant that we were led out to the very front of the starting line. Panic set in – we were right at the front, just behind Paula Radcliffe with an alarming number of people behind us, all anxious to get their pace right! 9am rolled round, the horn blew and we were away. Some of the speedier amongst us, (Kirsty and Alex) whizzed off into the distance whilst other more sensible (!) (Diane and I, Andrew was somewhere near the back but passed us fairly early on) joggers plodded along and avoided being pummelled out of the way by the real runners anxious to get away from the crowds. It was a great atmosphere though and for me, the first couple of kilometres sped by without too much difficulty and a wave at Peter Sandeman, until I hit the hilly bits. A short walk and then a lovely down hill stretch to Meanwood Road. Goodness me that’s a long road. Great musical turns along the way from a family with bongos, recorders and pans with wooden spoons but have to confess, I started to struggle a bit. Kirsty sped past me going back down the road whilst I was half way up but gave me a great shout of encouragement. I don’t think I’ve ever been more happy to pass the Grand Theatre – definitely knew it was almost over by then!  Some very impressive times though with the entire team completing the run between 52 minutes and an hour and 25 minutes – fairly respectable all round and we should have raised around £450 towards the ongoing refurbishment of City Varieties. All in all a great achievement and much more fun than I thought it was going to be.
Amy Dutton, Head of Communications

Paul Merton and Barry Cryer OBE amongst the guests and lent their support to what both agreed is a very special venue for many comedians.

Paul Merton and Barry Cryer at City Varieties Fundraising launch. Photo: Dorchester Ledbetter

Kay Mellor and Barry Cryer at City Varieties Fundraising Launch. Photo: Dorchester Ledbetter

Guests at the City Varieties fundraising launch. Photo: Dorchester LedbetterKay Mellor and Barry Cryer at City Varieties Fundraising Launch. Photo: Dorchester Ledbetter

Barry Cryer at City Varieties Fundraising launch. Photo: Dorchester Ledbetter

 To donate to the campaign visit www.cityvarieties.co.uk

The campaign has its launch on Tues 25 May in our sister venue, Leeds Grand Theatre and we’ll post some photos as soon as we can on Wednesday.

This restoration is much needed and thanks to funding from Leeds City Council and a generous grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund, work has been able to start but we still need to raise the final 1.26 million to complete this £9 million project. Thanks to the work of the Friends of City Varieties and other individuals, we are already on track with this final amount but we now need your help to complete the work and reopen in the autumn of 2011.