The Boston Theatre

The Boston Opera House, also known as the Citizens Bank Opera House, is a performing arts and esports venue located at 539 Washington St. in Boston, Massachusetts. It was originally built as the B.F. Keith Memorial Theatre, a movie palace in the Keith-Albee chain. The chain became part of RKO when it was established just before the theater opened on October 29, 1928, and it was also known as the RKO Keith's Theater. After operating for more than 50 years as a movie theater, it was rededicated in 1980 as a home for the Opera Company of Boston, which performed there until the opera company closed down in 1990 due to financial problems. The theater was reopened in 2004 after a major restoration, and it currently serves as the home of the Boston Ballet and also hosts touring Broadway shows. The theater serves as the home arena of the Boston Uprising of the Overwatch League.

The Gaiety Theatre (1878-1882) of Boston, Massachusetts, was located on Washington Street on the block between West and Avery Streets. J. Wentworth oversaw its operations. It occupied the former Melodeon. The Gaiety's 800-seat auditorium featured "walls and ceiling ... panelled in pink, with buff, gold and purple borders; the balcony fronts ... bronze, gray, and pink." In 1882 it became the Bijou Theatre.

The Melodeon (1839 - ca.1870) was a concert hall and performance space in 19th-century Boston, Massachusetts, located on Washington Street, near West Street. Musical concerts, lectures, sermons, conferences, visual displays, and popular entertainments occurred there.

The Bijou Theatre (1882–1943) in Boston, Massachusetts, occupied the second floor of 545 Washington Street near today's Theatre District. Architect George Wetherell designed the space, described by a contemporary reviewer as "dainty." Proprietors included Edward Hastings, George Tyler, and B.F. Keith. Around the 1900s, it featured a "staircase of heavy glass under which flowed an illuminated waterfall." The Bijou "closed 31 December 1943 and was razed in 1951." The building's facade still exists. It is currently a pending Boston Landmark by the Boston Landmarks Commission.

The West Street District is a historic district on West Street in Boston, Massachusetts, one of the city's "ladder districts" that runs between Tremont Street and Washington Street in the Downtown Crossing commercial/retail area. The district includes four buildings located near the corner of Tremont and West Streets, all built in the early 20th century. The two buildings at 148-150 Tremont Street were once occupied by Chandler and Company, an exclusive department store. Number 148 is a Renaissance Revival structure built as an office building in 1912, and number 150 was built in 1903 to house the Oliver Ditson Company, a music publisher. The Fabyan building at 26-30 West Street was designed by Coolidge, Shepley, Bulfinch & Abbott, and built in 1926. The Schraffts Building at 16-24 West Street was built in 1922, and housed a flagship candy store and restaurant for more than fifty years.The West Street District was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1980.

The Boston Theater District is the center of Boston's theater scene. Many of its theaters are on Washington Street, Tremont Street, Boylston Street, and Huntington Avenue.

The Modern Theatre is a theatre on Washington Street in Boston, Massachusetts. It first opened in 1876 as the Dobson Building designed by Levi Newcomb. It was renovated in 1914 as a movie theatre by architect Clarence Blackall; by 1980 it had fallen into neglect and dilapidation. In 2009–2010 Suffolk University demolished the building but retained the original facade of the theatre, and constructed a new building on the site. Suffolk's new Modern Theatre opened on November 4, 2010.The theatre is on the National Register of Historic Places (1979) and designated as a Boston Landmark by the Boston Landmarks Commission (2002).

R. H. White was a department store company of the 19th and 20th centuries, based in Boston. The company existed from 1853 to c. 1980; the flagship downtown Boston store was open from 1876 to 1957. The houses of Jordan, Marsh & Company and the R. H. White Company constitute the two leading department stores of Boston. R. H. White was founded in 1853. Originally on Winter Street, it moved in 1876 to a large ornate six-floor building (designed by Peabody and Stearns and built by McNeil Brothers) at 518–536 Washington Street, in the downtown shopping area. In 1928 the company was bought by Filene's and in 1944 ownership passed to City Stores, Inc. Both these companies continued the independent existence of the R. H. White brand and store. In 1953 the store celebrated its centennial with a makeover and refurbishment of the flagship store, and various events. But urban decay had crept up to the lower edge of the downtown shopping area where R. H. White was located (the so-called Combat Zone would soon spring up a few blocks away). By 1956 sales were down and the store was no longer profitable; City Stores closed the flagship downtown store in 1957.The building stood empty for a while, then – with tax incentives from the City of Boston – City Stores refurbished it and opened a new store called Citymart, which opened in August 1962. Citymart included a full grocery store and a babysitting service for shoppers. The store was not successful as the neighborhood continued to deteriorate. In 1966 the Boston Redevelopment Authority seized the building by eminent domain and moved Raymond's department store there as part of a larger urban renewal project. Raymond's ceased operation in 1972. The building was later torn down to make way for the Lafayette Place Mall urban shopping center.The R. H. White brand continued to exist for a while, and City Stores operated R. H. White branch stores in suburban malls (such as Worcester's Lincoln Plaza shopping center). But by 1980 City Stores was bankrupt and all R. H. White outlets were closed.

Paramount Theatre is a theatre in Boston on Washington Street, between Avery and West Streets.

Washington Gardens (1814 – ca.1829) was a place of public entertainment and refreshment in early 19th-century Boston, Massachusetts. Also known as Vauxhall, it specialized in fireworks, circuses, musical and theatrical performances, pictorial exhibitions, and the occasional balloonist and necromancer. John H. Schaffer oversaw the enterprise beginning in 1814.

Amory Hall (c. 1834 – c. 1888) was located on the corner of Washington Street and West Street in Boston, Massachusetts, in the 19th century. Myriad activities took place in the rental hall, including sermons; lectures by Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson, William Lloyd Garrison; political meetings; exhibitions by Rembrandt Peale, George Catlin, John Banvard; moving panoramas; magic shows; concerts; and curiosities such as the "Nova Scotia Giant Boy." Through the years, tenants included: First Free Congregational Church (c. 1836); Grace Church (1836); artists Eastman Johnson, J.C. King, N. Southworth, T.T. Spear, William S. Tiffany (c.1847); Oliver Stearns, retailer of artists' supplies (1849–1850); artists J.A. Codman, A. Ransom, and R.M. Staigg (c.1852).In 1888, the hall was acquired by retailer William H. Zinn and incorporated into his "Connected Stores" occupying the block bounded by West and Washington Streets and Temple Place.

Temple Place Historic District is a national historic district at 11-55, 26-58 Temple Place in Boston, Massachusetts. The district encompasses a set of fifteen well-preserved 19th and early-20th century buildings representing the increasing commercialization of the area, which was a fashionable upper-class address in the late 18th century. The earliest buildings date from the 1830s and are Greek Revival in style. Three buildings (29-43 Temple Place) were designed by noted Boston architect Nathaniel J. Bradlee, and are rare surviving examples of his work which predate the Great Boston Fire of 1872; one building (25-27 Temple) was designed by Peabody and Stearns.The district was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1988. Among the former tenants: Ritz & Hastings, photographers (1860s-1880s).