Good Venue Guide 20: West Yorkshire Playhouse

Date of birth: latest incarnation - 8 March 1990.

Brief history: it began life as another theatre in another place. In 1969 the Leeds Theatre Committee, which had been looking for premises for a new Leeds theatre since 1964, persuaded the University of Leeds to lend the site of a proposed sports hall. A temporary theatre was built for only pounds 150,000 and opened with the world premiere of Alan Plater's Simon Says in September 1970 under the directorship of John Harrison. Prince Charles officially opened the theatre as The Playhouse in December of that year. But as it was only designed to last for 10 years, by the mid-1980s the building was falling into dilapidation. Leeds City Council put aside a site for a new theatre and the competition for its design was won by Appleton Associates, a husband-and-wife team from Edinburgh. The Quarry Hill Flats, an infamous estate of Thirties-style apartments, was razed to the ground, and the West Yorkshire Playhouse rose from the rubble. It finally opened in 1990, having cost pounds 13.5 million, with Jude Kelly at the helm. It consists of two auditoria and an outside performance space.

Uses: the theatre stages over1,000 performances, workshops, readings and community events each year, attended by over 250,000 people..

Recommended seats: Courtyard Theatre, centre of Area A (pounds 15.50). Quarry Theatre, Centre Block F-G (15.50).

Current event: Irvine Welsh's first stage play, You'll Have Had Your Hole, a "revenger's tragedy for the chemical age", set in a disused recording studio. Welsh has recently indicated a change in his preoccupations - "I've reached the stage now where, if there's any reference to drugs or music on the dust jacket of a book, I'll put it straight down" - so perhaps it's worth checking out if there's life, and inspiration, beyond Trainspotting. Thurs to 21 Mar. Tickets: pounds 8-pounds 15. All bookings on 0113 213 7700.

Landmark productions: Alan Rickman's The Winter Guest in 1995.

Where to meet: there's a restaurant on site.

Cost of a glass of wine: pounds 1.80.