Designed by the legendary John Eberson and built by the Loew’s Theater Corporation, Richmond’s Loew’s Theatre is in the front rank of 1920s movie palace architecture. With its mixture of Moorish and Spanish Baroque influences, Loew’s was considered the most up-to-date theater in the South when it opened on April 9, 1928. The auditorium, with Churrigueresque facades and a ceiling treated to give the illusion of a starry night sky with moving clouds, gave the effect of a Spanish plaza. Such architectural theatricality was essential to the so-called “atmospheric” motion-picture house, where the viewer, seated in the proper atmosphere, would achieve greatest enjoyment of the film. The Loew’s Theater was acquired and restored in the 1980s by the Virginia Center for the Performing Arts and later renamed the Carpenter Center for the Performing Arts. It is a centerpiece of the West Grace Street Commercial Historic District.