Townhouse Studios history, being the first studio in the UK to install one of their B-series consoles. The 1000th console produced by SSL was installed in studio one. The SSL B mixing desk still exists. Studio One originally was home to a 72-input Helios console with an Alison 64K computer mixdown system, which now resides at Shorefire Recording Studios, Long Branch, New Jersey, United States. In July 1984, Townhouse 3 was opened, this being the old Ramport Studios in Battersea, purchased from the Who, the Helios from Townhouse 1 eventually being installed there, replacing a Neve, the Helios later giving way to
MGM-British Studios Meanwhile, Amalgamated Studios Ltd constructed a large studio on the north side of Elstree Way between 1935 and 1937. A January 1937 deal for eight films to be made for the American studio Columbia Pictures soon collapsed. The company was unable to meet the cost of building work, and sold the facility to the Rank Organisation, which was not interested in using the studios itself, but wanted to stop John Maxwell's rival British International Pictures (BIP) from being able to compete more effectively with its own new Pinewood Studios. During the war, the studios were leased from Rank by the