Historic Chinatown building was Canada's first movie theatre

The building that housed Canada's first movie theatre was destroyed in a Chinatown fire Thursday.

The Robillard building on St-Laurent Blvd. was not an official heritage site, but boasted a rich history nonetheless.

Built in the 1890s, the Robillard building’s theatre was 300 seats large, and was once a variety and vaudeville venue called the Palace Theatre.

In June 1896, Louis Minier used a room in the Robillard to project the first indoor moving picture film in Canada, using the famous Lumiere brothers' cinematographe.

The first outdoor projection was tried a few weeks earlier, on a wall of a hotel next door.

According to a city website, the Robillard was used for projections from 1896-97, making it the first cinema in Canada.

Minier was an official dealer for the famous Lumiere brothers, who are credited with inventing the early motion picture camera, called the cinematographe, first used in 1895.

The building became run down in recent years.

In 2015, its owners requested permits to undergo substantial renovations -- to the roof, the first floor, the basement and the facade -- but that work was not completed.

In April, the Quebec health and safety board halted renovations because there was too much asbestos, said contractor Roberto Labrie.

“I'm like everybody, I'm sad this morning to have seen that,” said city councillor Richard Bergeron. “The architecture itself will be a big loss for Montreal.”

The opposition at city hall blames the Coderre administration on failing to keep track of the city’s historical sites, in particular those that have become run down.

“We have regulations on the maintenance of heritage buildings in Montreal, on all buildings actually, but the boroughs do not have the means in terms of human resources, inspectors,” said Projet Montreal councillor Anne-Marie Sigouin.

The mayor’s office issued a statement Thursday saying his team has taken several initiatives to protect heritage sites and before work on the Robillard was stopped, they were in contact with the owner to ensure the building would flourish.

A spokesperson for the mayor would not comment on what went wrong, nor would the son of the owner, who was at the scene Thursday evening.

The city needs to find better ways to protect heritage and landmarks from fire, said Heritage Montreal's Dinu Bumbaru.

“We all care about what’s happening in Syria with Palmyra and all the historic town there, but somehow at home, we have this issue of preventing losses of heritage to disaster like this one,” he said.