Devonshire Vat

Devonshire Hotel, 96-102 Seaside Road, Eastbourne.

R. Grist.

Devonshire Vat

There was a Devonshire Tavern on Seaside Road by 1869. It later became the Devonshire Hotel where R Grist was the landlord in the 1920’s.

The Devonshire Hotel was next to Eastbourne’s Royal Hippodrome Theatre. The area around the Theatre was heavily bombed by the Luftwaffe in World War II. The theatre itself escaped a direct hit, but many buildings around it were obliterated. The site of the Devonshire Hotel now has on it the Liberal Democrats Eastbourne office and the Cartoon Café, with flats above the office and café.

The Cartoon Café  is the only permanent exhibition space in the UK that is completely dedicated to original cartoon art, including seaside-related political cartoon artwork and a range of Spitting Image memorabilia. It  regularly hosts exhibitions of original cartoons by leading cartoonists from both the UK and around the world. Some of the ‘names’ that have exhibited include Steve Bell (The Guardian), Chris Riddell (The Observer), Peter Brookes (The Times) and Dave Brown (The Independent). There have been themed shows of cartoon characters such as Fred Bassett, The Giles Family, Andy Capp, Snoopy and Charlie Brown, and Jane.