Collins' Music Hall

Collins’s Music Hall stood on the west side of Islington Green, between Upper Street and Essex Road. Before it, a pub with a small theatre had existed there since the late 18th century. Sam Collins, a comedian and impresario, bought the closed hall in 1861 and rebuilt it. He opened the new hall in November 1863 with a crowded house and lavish entertainment. Collins died two years later, leaving his widow Annie to run the business with help from family friends. The hall became famous for strict management under Herbert Sprake, earning the nickname “The Chapel on the Green.” Performers such as Harry Tate, Bessie Wentworth and later George Robey and Gracie Fields appeared on its stage. In 1897 the building was rebuilt with space for nearly 1,800 people and renamed Collins’s Theatre of Varieties. The new auditorium drew top stars but later struggled through unsettled decades. After a fire in 1958 the interior was gutted and the hall closed for good. The 1897 façade survived and now fronts a Waterstones bookshop. Inside, customers walk past the preserved frontage, a quiet reminder of the lively performances once held behind it. The bookshop shelves occupy the space where the stage once stood.