Situated at the corner of Scotts Road and the Orchard Road tourist and shopping belt, the Lido Theatre (right) was built together with the neighbouring 10-storey Shaw House in 1958. Both buildings were owned by the Shaw Brothers film studio founded by brothers Runme and Run Run Shaw in the 1930s, and designed by the architecture firm Iversen, Van Sitteren & Partners. Lido Theatre was officially opened in February 1959 in a grand ceremony that was attended by prominent figures such as then Prime Minister of Malaya, Tengku Abdul Rahman, and then British Commissioner for Southeast Asia, Sir Robert Scott. Touted as the “most luxurious cinema in Singapore”, the theatre was fully air-conditioned and came equipped with the latest in motion picture technology, which included an all-purpose American Walker Hi-Gain screen and an American Simplex XL curved gates water-cooled projector with magnetic stereophonic sound system. The theatre was the fourth of five new cinemas erected as part of Shaw’s expansion plans in Singapore. Both Lido Theatre and Shaw House were demolished in 1991 to make way for a new shopping, cinema and office complex bearing the same names.
