Bray Studios - Chronology
Year |
The Studio |
Movies |
| 1951 | Hammer Film Productions, in search of a base to make their budget horror films, settles on the derelict Down Place, a country house on the banks of the River Thames, between the towns of Bray and Windsor. Shooting in country houses avoided the need to build sets, and usually also meant large grounds were available for location work. |
|
| 1952 | As the one year lease on Down Place had run out, and a union strike prevented a move to a studio, Hammer decide to build a studio in the grounds of Down Place, and name it Bray Studios, after the local town. | |
| 1965 | Mr Ernest Oliver, owner of Oakley Court and some woodland adjacent to Bray Studios, dies, leaving the Court uninhabited. The building became an ideal setting for many Bray productions, especially featuring in Hammer Films, the St Trinians series, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Half a Sixpence and Murder By Death. | |
| 1973 - 75 | Bray Studios were the home of the special effects team for Gerry Andersons "Space 1999" series 1. All the special model effects of Eagle spacecraft, alien spacecraft, Moonbase Alpha and long shots on alien planets were all filmed here. All sets with the actors were filmed at Pinewood. |
|
| 1975 | Bray was where the Anglo-German sci-fi series "Star Maidens" was filmed. This included all model work and the standing sets on the planet Mendusa, internal sets of the various spacecraft. Keith Wilson, the series designer, also worked on Space 1999 and shipped in various props and set dressings to re-use from it from Pinewood. | |
| Jan 1976-Feb 1977 | Bray was again the home of the special effects team when they worked on the second series of "Space 1999". |
|
| ?1979-80 | ?Hammer House of Horror TV series filmed at Bray. | |
| 1981 | Oakley Court, featured in dozens of films produced at Bray, is reopened as a luxury country house hotel. | |
| Sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hammer_Film_Productions Thanks to Mark Anthony Craig for additional information |