The owners of a popular Brighton entertainment venue hope a £450,000 refit will help attract the best acts from oversees.

Extensive redevelopments at Komedia, in Gardner Street, will create more room for theatre, dance and cabaret performers.

Spokeswoman Alice Hartmann, said the plans were modelled on eastern European factories which have been successfully converted into performance spaces.

She said: "At the moment Komedia is very compartmented because there are lots of walls and corridors.

"The first floor will be transformed into a giant space to accommodate bigger shows. We will be literally raising the roof and knocking down walls to make the room higher, bigger and wider."

The current 200-seat theatre will be closed from mid-January and will reopen three months later with a programme of international theatre and dance for the Brighton Festival in May.

Ms Hartmann said: "We have always wanted to enhance our programme and the only way we can do this is to improve the facilities.

"We need to have a better space to bring people over from abroad and we need to refresh the venue. The circulation of people through the building is not as good as it should be and the improvements will give the acts a better way of getting in."

The future performance space will be turned into a cabaret venue by removing specially-designed mobile seating. Disabled access and facilities will also be improved as will the dressing rooms.

A new bar, twice the size of the current one and the creation of a kitchen, will allow 150 people to have hot pre- and after-show suppers.

This is the first phase of a major redevelopment. The second part will take place in 2004, when the Jubilee Street site at the back of the venue is transformed.

While the building work is taking place from January next year to April, the cabaret in the basement will remain open with a mixed programme of music and comedy.

A gallery is also being created over the bar.