Thames Television - Studios

Studios

When Thames was formed, the new company acquired the numerous properties of both the former Rediffusion and ABC. This meant that Thames now acquired Rediffusion's London headquarters at Television House and their main studio complex at Wembley on top of ABC's headquarters and London base at Teddington, their Midlands base in Aston, co-owned with ATV, their northern base in Didsbury, Manchester and a sales office in central Manchester. For the company to survive, it couldn't own all of these studios and so many were sold off.

The former Rediffusion studios at Wembley were sold off to London Weekend Television by order of the ITA. These studios were used by LWT until 1970, when they moved into the London Television Centre, and have since been in independent ownership under the name of Fountain Studios. ABC's Aston studios were sold to ATV, who already owned half of the studio complex and who now took full control, and who sold the site a few years later to an independent local radio station. The Didsbury site was for a time used by Yorkshire Television prior to the Kirkstall Road studios construction, but was later sold to Manchester Polytechnic. The offices in Manchester were also sold.

This left Thames with a main production base at the former ABC studios at Teddington, and with their headquarters in the former Rediffusion property Television House until 1970, when Thames' corporate base moved to their newly constructed studios and base at Thames Television House on Euston Road. The Teddington studios were highly desirable, as they had participated in colour experiments and were already partially converted, and as such were sought after by both Thames and LWT.

Following the loss of Thames' franchise and the amalgamation of the company into talkbackTHAMES, the Euston Road base of Thames was sold off and demolished. The site of the studios is currently occupied by Triton Square and the registered headquarters of the British operation of Spanish bank Santander. The studios at Teddington were sold to a management buy-out team and are now part of the Pinewood Group, owners of both Pinewood and Shepperton Studios.