page_title: Regent Theatre, Dunedin
section_title: Annual book sale
hierarchical_section_title: Regent Theatre, Dunedin / Annual book sale
caption_attribution_description: The Regent Theatre 24-hour Book Sale in Dunedin, New Zealand is New Zealand's and possibly the Southern Hemisphere's largest second-hand book sale.
context_page_description: The Regent Theatre is a theatre in Dunedin, New Zealand with a seating capacity of about 1,650. It is in The Octagon, the city's central plaza, directly opposite the Municipal Chambers and close to the Dunedin Public Art Gallery.
  Originally a 2,000 seat cinema the Regent opened on 1 June 1928, and the interior is elaborately decorated in a revived baroque style, characteristic of the super cinemas of the time. The design is a variation of Robert Atkinson's for the 1921 Regent cinema in Brighton, England, which was demolished in 1974. There were comparable picture palaces in other cities in Britain and Australia, few of which now survive and, apart from the Dunedin building, none in their original form. All these designs are descended from Charles Garnier's for the Paris Opera, completed in 1875. The Regent's auditorium succeeds in replaying the exuberance of the original in a very different time and space.
  The Dunedin building's supervising architect was James Hodge White, one of the founders of the Dunedin architectural firm Miller White & Dunn. It was sited behind a building on the Octagon designed by David Ross which was first opened in 1876.
context_section_description: As it is run by a charitable trust, the theatre relies on the support of the local community for its continued existence.
  A major part of this support is the Regent 24-hour Book Sale, the largest sale of second-hand books in New Zealand, and reputedly the largest in the Southern Hemisphere. Every May since 1979, books donated by the general public are sold at the theatre by volunteers over the course of 24 hours. Over 200,000 books are on sale each year, most of them priced at NZ$1 each (although a smaller number of specialist books are on sale at a higher price). The price of an ordinary book was 50c until 2008, when it was doubled. Buyers come from throughout New Zealand for the sale, which has become a major event on Dunedin's calendar, and raises around $100,000 annually.
caption: Bibliophiles pore over books at the annual Regent Book Sale
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