Archinect - News

Studio Gang's Samuel H. Scripps Theater Center breaks ground in the Hudson Valley

2024-09-27T11:01:00-04:00

Work on the first-ever LEED Platinum theater in the United States has commenced in New York’s Hudson River Valley. By summer 2026, the new 14,850-square-foot permanent home for the Hudson Valley Shakespeare company from Studio Gang, the Samuel H. Scripps Theater Center, will welcome guests to open air performances on its donated 98-acre campus in Garrison. Nelson Byrd Woltz is included for the landscape program of the surrounding site, which had been previously been used as a golf course.

Jeanne Gang says: "The architecture weaves in elements of the natural environment to create a unique indoor-outdoor setting for the company’s open-air productions and to offer an unparalleled theater experience."

Image courtesy of Studio Gang

Also in the Hudson Valley, HWKN is designing a new expansion of the CCS Bard Library and Archives and ARO is planning a mass timber visitor center at the Frederic Church Center for Art and Landscape at the Olana State Historic Site with Nelson Byrd Woltz. Stu...

Neri&Hu complete new Shanghai Performing Arts Center, challenging traditional entertainment venue design

2024-09-25T18:43:00-04:00

Neri&Hu has designed a new performing arts space for Shanghai with 2,500 seats and a multipurpose space they feel will challenge ostentatious tropes latent in 21st-century iterations of the typology.

Located in Shanghai’s busy Qiantan commercial area, the New Bund 31 Performing Arts Center shines as a cultural beacon amidst a forest of tall buildings. Neri&Hu chose to conceptualize its interior as an 'arena' in the Classical sense, arranging a stacked layer of arches to frame the venue’s performance space and five-story atrium.

Photo by Pedro Pegenaute

The arches are repeated on the outside in bronze-toned cassettes lining the ground-level facade. Back inside, bronze is used again in the bathroom fixtures. Copper finishes line the elevators to floating balconied seating boxes, and the the VIP lounge made out of perforated bricks.

Photo by Pedro Pegenaute

Set against this is the design of a smaller black box exhibition space component that services the theater's MICE (meetings, incen...

Studio Gang to design new home for the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival in Upstate New York

2023-12-01T12:29:00-05:00

Studio Gang has revealed plans for the new home of the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival in Upstate New York.

Located in the town of Garrison, the 13,850-square-foot performing arts space is set to become the first-ever LEED Platinum theater design in the United States when it is completed.

Nelson Byrd Woltz will provide landscaping for the site, a 98-acre former golf course that was donated to the company in 2020. Anchored by an open-air theater, the design frames the surrounding natural landscape to allow for actors to emerge from the topography.

Image courtesy Studio Gang

A timber-framed shell with wooden columns that supports the proscenium arch is carefully oriented to frame the surrounding Wey-Gat (or “Wind Gate”) for the audience and players. The remaining program calls for the construction of several small pavilions that will house the company's back-of-house operations, theater concessions, and standalone public restrooms. Costs of the project were not available at press ...

REX opens The Lindemann Performing Arts Center at Brown University

2023-10-20T20:00:00-04:00

Brown University has shared photos to go along with the inauguration of its new REX/Joshua Ramus-designed Lindemann Performing Arts Center tomorrow in Providence, Rhode Island.

The building supports both performance and instruction on campus with an emphasis on creating new forms of collaboration inside a 101,000-square-foot container of flexibly configurable spaces. It combines with the twelve-year-old Diller Scofidio + Renfro-designed Perry and Marty Granoff Center for the Creative Arts next door to create the new Ronald O. Perelman Arts District, which is accessible from Brown’s main The Walk pedestrian corridor and provides the city with an added cultural venue as the university’s footprint within it expands.

Photo: Iwan Baan.

An extruding fluted aluminum rain screen facade gives the shoe box-like structure its complexity. The design includes a main hall that can be reconfigured five ways to accommodate between 70 and 530 people, depending on ne...

Frida Escobedo and Handel's National Black Theatre project tops out in Harlem

2023-10-09T17:24:00-04:00

Frida Escobedo and Handel Architects have shared photos of their newly topped-out National Black Theatre and Ray Harlem mixed-use development in Manhattan.

The project entails a new 27,000-square-foot theater, retail spaces, and a 222-unit residential component strategically located along the historic 125th Street corridor in East Harlem. It is the first scheme in the city to utilize the Visual and Performing Arts bonus included in a comprehensive 2008 rezoning plan, expanding on the late National Black Theatre founder Barbara Ann Teer’s vision for “an artistic ecosystem that uplifts the community,” according to Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine. Proponents say its creation is also a catalyst for greater representation in the theater and cultural industries overall.

Image © Brett Tiagwad

Construction will now continue towards the NBT’s expected public opening in 2026. Once complete, the theater will include a 250-seat immersive technology performance space, a 99-seat flexible s...

Lemay completes major redesign of Montreal’s 1950s Théâtre de Verdure

2023-08-29T13:55:00-04:00

Montreal-baed Lemay has completed a redesign of the city’s Théâtre de Verdure. The original 1956 development has been enhanced with what the firm calls a “4-season concept that redefines the relationship between theatre and park, architecture and landscape, and the built and the natural.”

Image credit: Adrien Williams

The redesign sought to make the outdoor theater’s presence felt throughout the adjacent La Fontaine Park, maximizing views of both the stage and surrounding greenspace. Designed to address both visitors and passers-by, the form “invites discovery, both inside and outside the site” with a “new green, modern, and lively public space that offers a vibrant place for lovers of arts and culture to witness unforgettable moments.”

Image credit: Adrien Williams

"Throughout the project, we were keen to reaffirm the theatre's heritage identity, and we took care to develop new interventions compatible with the memory of the site," explained Marie-Ève Parent, Associate and Discipline...

Mario Botta details La Scala makeover for the NYT

2023-05-02T19:33:00-04:00

The work has been about creating a dialogue between the 18th century and modernity. This theater was born as a space to create dreams, illusions, adventures. It’s still a place of collective imagination. But to effectively make it work today, it needed to be much more flexible and capable than what existed in the 1700s. It had run out of space to perform effectively. We’ve created a series of elements designed to make the theater function for the 2000s.

The Swiss architect began his two-phase restoration in January 2002. It has been the subject of controversy since that time, owing to its scale and derivation from the city council tender approvals process. The project highlights the delicate line between preservation and the ambits of a figure such as Botta, whose deference to the past has always been expressed in materials such as terra cotta and Botticino marble.

To that score, Botta says his approach to design has evolved to be a sort of commentary on the "confrontation between times [...] A collage of different language," adding we’ve "lost the capacity to express the true value of architecture."

"I find that architecture is always a sacred act, because it transforms nature and it represents our entire world," he states at the end of the NYT interview. "The architecture of sacred spaces is very close to the architecture of theaters or museums. You’re trying to create a type of value and strength. You’re attempting to embody a ...

France debuts 'Ball Theater' pavilion installation ahead of the 2023 Venice Biennale

2023-04-27T13:09:00-04:00

France’s pavilion to the 18th International Architecture Exhibition at the Venice Biennale will feature an immersive interchange of identity and emotion inspired by ballroom dances and human rituals of experience-based social cohesion.

French studio Muoto partnered with scenographers Georgi Stanishev and Clémence La Sagna for the design of Ball Theater, which they say ties into curator Lesley Lokko’s thematic look to the future where “architecture is no longer to represent or to be represented as an image.”

Image courtesy of Muoto, Georgi Stanishev and Clémence La Sagna

Their project for the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs takes the form of a semi-spherical intervention that’s configurable for different immersive experiences all based around Ball Theater’s usage as a forum for artistic performances and civic inquiry.

Image courtesy of Muoto, Georgi Stanishev and Clémence La Sagna

Special events will be held in its hollowed chamber space, taking...

Diller Scofidio + Renfro issues update on historic Frank Lloyd Wright theater revitalization in Dallas

2022-12-12T18:50:00-05:00

Diller Scofidio + Renfro has shared new project details and a flythrough animation for their planned revitalization of the 63-year-old Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Kalita Humphreys Theater in Dallas.

The project’s scope revolves around a “faithful reinterpretation of Wright’s original design intent” that calls for the removal of several decades worth of accumulated additions; creation of a new “theater arts complex” outside that includes a new performance venue, two pavilions, and a 100-seat black box theater; demolition of the existing Heldt Building; and further development of the William B. Dean Park with an emphasis on “stitching” the site with the popular nearby Katy Trail and Turtle Creek attractions.

Image courtesy Diller Scofidio + Renfro

According to a press release, the final plans will be submitted to the city no later than December 31st of this year. Chicago-based preservation specialists Harboe Architects is also involved with the planning team, helping to restore the so...

An open role for an auditorium designer offers a reflection on the architecture of performance

2022-11-23T12:04:00-05:00

Following last week’s look at an opening for a Net Zero Emerging Leaders Intern at LEVER Architecture, we are using our Job Highlights series this week to explore an open role on Archinect Jobs for an Auditorium and Seating Designer at Theatre Projects Consultants.

The full-time role, based in Norwalk, Connecticut, calls for a “creative, passionate auditorium and seating designer” with prior experience in theatrical and architectural design. Among the responsibilities for the role will be the design of room forms and seating layouts for a variety of projects, including performance venues, immersive environments, themed entertainment, education, corporate, and public gathering spaces.

Archinect Feature: Rex’s Brown University Performing Arts Center Shape-Shifts to Fill a Campus Void

Why the role interests us

Throughout the year, our editorial has seen how the design of performance venues and theaters involves careful engagement across a wide series of scales. On an urban scale, recen...

OMA's Taipei Performing Arts Center officially opens

2022-08-08T15:54:00-04:00

The new Taipei Performing Arts Center by OMA has opened to the public in the city’s Shilin Night Market. Led by Rem Koolhaas and David Gianotten, the project comprises three theaters: a spherical 800-seat Globe Playhouse, a 1,500-seat Grand Theater, and an 800-seat Blue Box, connected to a central cube.

Previously on Archinect: OMA's role-defying new theater design debuts in Taipei

The cube houses the stages, backstages, and support spaces of the theaters, which allows the Grand Theater and the Blue Box to come together to form a Super Theater.

Image © Shephotoerd Co. Photography, courtesy of OMA

Image © OMA

The Globe features a unique proscenium that supports experimentation with stage framing. The opaque façades of the theaters juxtapose the animated and illuminated central cube that is clad in corrugated glass.

Image © Shephotoerd Co. Photography, courtesy of OMA

Image © OMA

A landscaped plaza sits beneath the central cube, which is lifted off the ground to accommodate t...

OMA's role-defying new theater design debuts in Taipei

2022-05-16T13:20:00-04:00

New photos have been released of the recently completed Tapei Performing Arts Center by OMA.

Now a part of the capital city’s Shilin Night Market, the new Center houses two 800-seat theaters and a larger 1,500-seat venue in addition to support areas all connected by a centralizing cube-like form that OMA founder Rem Koolhaas thinks will free both patron and performer from a stultifying industry-wide trend.

Image: © OMA by Chris Stowers

“Theater has a very long tradition. We have seen contemporary performance theaters increasingly becoming standardized, with conservative internal operation principles. We want to contribute to the history of the theater,” Koolhaas explained in a statement. “Here in Taipei, we were able to combine three auditoria in a particular way. We are interested to see how this architecture will have an impact in terms of extending what we can do in theater.”

Image © Shephotoerd Co. Photography, courtesy of OMA

Photos reveal the cubic ...

Frank Gehry reveals an upgraded design for Downtown LA's transformational Colburn Center

2022-03-16T21:27:00-04:00

The musical fabric of Los Angeles is about to get a significant boost from one of its most famous creative backers after Frank Gehry’s updated plans for the Colburn School were made public for the first time in a live-streamed ceremony at its downtown campus earlier today.

Renderings reveal a 100,000-square-foot expansion of the school’s existing facilities into what will be called the Colburn Center, a dynamic new set of interlocking performance venues and public spaces that will couple with a generous set of scholarship programs to further enhance the 72-year-old school’s educational and artistic offerings.

The project is an integral part of the architect's mission to transform the Downtown Los Angeles landscape beginning with his iconic Walt Disney Concert Hall up the street and culminating with his latest, directly adjacent mixed-use addition called The Grand. Gehry worked together with longtime collaborators Michael Ferguson and Yasuhisa Toyota of Nagat...

Glass box theater? Designers like Es Devlin are making the Fourth Wall out of something new

2021-10-21T17:59:00-04:00

Even before Covid-19, many ambitious productions had been taking place not in the three-sided black boxes that defined the experimental zest and emerging punk of the late 1970s, or […] theater-in-the-round pioneered in ancient Greece and Rome, but in elaborately engineered glass cubes that evoke the International Style’s high Modernism and the minimalist penthouses of the contemporary metropolis. There would not seem to be a more flagrant violation of dramatic immediacy.

Glass cube sets from Miriam Buether, artist Todd Knope, and Expo 2020 Dubai British Pavillion designer Es Devlin have been popular among directors like Sam Mendes. One of Devlin's previous designs was based on a temporary Rachel Whitehead installation in East London from 1993. The artist's work will take center stage once again with the reopening of Mendes' The Lehman Trilogy, which plays at New York's Nederlander Theater until January 2nd.

View this post on Instagram A post shared by The Lehman Trilogy on Broadway (@lehmantrilogybway)

“There’s a message embedded in a single room,” the three-time Olivier Award winner told the Times, “that architecture itself is the vessel through which history — whether intimate or monumental — is enacted. Glass helps you make that message explicit: A room is more than just a passive container. It remembers life.”

A Las Vegas theater company knows the value of having an interior architect on board (and they're hiring one right now)

2021-08-07T09:00:00-04:00

Having a background as an architect offers a specific level of expertise that can be used outside of traditional employment formats. Archinect has been connecting with architects and design professionals from various backgrounds since 1997.

Our industry-leading job board publishes approximately 150 new opportunities every week. Employment offerings from numerous locations and thousands of firms, organizations, creative companies, and institutions offer a mix of career opportunities for architects and design professionals from a variety of backgrounds and experiences.

Beyond traditional employment openings from small, medium, and large firms, Archinect Jobs also showcases a selection of unique job opportunities for architects.

Last week, our editorial team highlighted an exciting job opening to work as a Treehouse Designer. This week, renowned American theater company Spiegelworld is searching for an Interior Architect or Interior Designer for a remote position with their team.

Im...

David Rockwell on his favorite historic NYC Broadway theaters

2020-03-31T00:45:00-04:00

I find it interesting that theaters are so resilient. They can have many lives. [...] For architects, set design can be a lesson in the fact that nothing is permanent. Permanence can be a little restricting, it turns out. Theater isn’t permanent. It exists when there is an audience.

Michael Kimmelman shares an interview with architect David Rockwell, who talked about some of his favorite historic Broadway theaters in NYC while the two went on a walk recently. Rockwell talks about the influence that theater had for him as a child, a few theater design projects his firm worked on, and not to mention some valuable, heartfelt lessons that the world of musical theater can teach during these uncertain times.

wHY's new opera and ballet theater in Russia mimics the movement of dance and music

2020-02-07T18:02:00-05:00

wHY received approval from the city of Perm, Russa on the design of the new Tchaikovsky Academic Opera and Ballet Theater last month. Located at the heart of the city, the new building aims to become a focal point for the growing arts district along the Kama River. Accompanied by a new park, the development sits at the center of a cultural revitalization initiative spearheaded by the city's mayor, Dmitry Samoilov.

"Our goal is to create a new cultural landmark and an international destination for Perm and Russia, with a space that reflects the dynamism and creativity of the performances held within," said Andrija Stojic, director of wHY's New York office and Buildings Workshop. "I believe that music acts as a bridge between past and future: our design will embrace the history and local culture of Perm, while providing the world-class building that the Tchaikovsky Opera and Ballet deserves to have."

The design challenges the typical theater typology that favors a closed-off, secluded...

10 spectacular performance spaces for your Friday inspiration

2020-01-10T08:00:00-05:00

In case you haven't checked out Archinect's Pinterest boards in a while, we have compiled ten recently pinned images from outstanding projects on various Archinect Firm and People profiles.

(Tip: use the handy FOLLOW feature to easily keep up-to-date with all your favorite Archinect profiles!)

Today's top images (in no particular order) are from the NEW board Performance Spaces.

↑ Mariinsky II Theatre in St. Petersburg, Russia by Diamond Schmitt Architects with KP ViPS

↑ Palais de la Musique et des Congrès Strasbourg in Strasbourg, France by dietrich.untertrifaller architekten

↑ BLUEBARN Theatre in Omaha, NE by Actual Architecture Co.; Photo: Paul Crosby

↑ Shaftesbury Theatre in London, UK by Bennetts Associates; Photo: Peter Cook

↑ The Theatre School, DePaul University in Chicago, IL by Pelli Clarke Pelli Architects; Photo: Jeff Goldberg/Esto

↑ Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts in Beverly Hills, CA by SPF:architects

↑ Theatre Agora in Lelystad, The Netherlands by UNSt...

Radical Reconfigurability; A Conversation With REX, Threshold and Theatre Projects About the Brown University Performing Arts Center

2019-05-21T09:30:00-04:00

This week Ken and I are speaking with the leadership team responsible for the upcoming Brown University Performing Arts Center – Joshua Ramus of REX, Carl Giegold of Threshold Acoustics and David Rosenburg of Theatre Projects.

Brown University Performing Arts Center, East Rendering by Luxigon

The Brown University Performing Arts Center is a formally stunning project designed by REX for the Brown University campus in the relatively small town of Providence, Rhode Island. The exterior of the almost 100,000 square foot building consists of a large monolithic mass clad in aluminum, with a cantilevered glass-encased 13-foot tall clearstory jutting out from the lobby level, covering a lower-level outdoor public space.

From left to right: Joshua Ramus, Carl P. Giegold, & David H. Rosenburg

The interior of the Arts Center, however, is where the magic happens. To facilitate the university’s requirement to host performances for a variety of needs and audience sizes, REX and his team of theate...

O-S Architectes redesigns local Jacques Carat Theater in Cachan, Paris

2018-10-25T15:36:00-04:00

Back in 2011, O-S Architectes won the competition to restructure and expand the Jacques Carat Theater. Located in the Cachan commune in Paris, the original theater was built in 1988 and inaugurated the following year. The theater's restructuring was completed last year and now comprises of two simple volumes, which are organized around the existing central auditorium.

Photo: Cyrille Weiner.

The first volume is a transparent building with multiple openings and the foyer, which then leads to the auditoriums in the second volume. Composed of terracotta elements, the second volume envelopes the project like a “stage curtain”. The theater entrance is like “an outstretched hand that prompts and guides visitors, [and] is marked by a fold that paces the length of the façade,” O-S Architectes says.

Photo: Cyrille Weiner.

The ground floor includes a spacious reception area, two auditor...

Two historic NYC theaters in Times Square to be redeveloped

2018-09-20T14:59:00-04:00

Two historic New York City theaters are getting ready to shine brightly under the Times Square spotlight once again. This week, developers behind the Times Square Theater and the Palace Theater, unveiled ambitious renovation and expansion plans for their establishments.

The Palace Theater redevelopment includes raising the structure about 30 feet to accommodate retail space below and an 18,000 square foot wraparound sign. The existing DoubleTree hotel above the theater will be demolished to be replaced by a 46-story tower including retail, dining, and a hotel.

TSX Broadway rendering. Image: TSX Broadway.

The new complex, called TSX Broadway, also includes a 4,000-square-foot performance venue to be suspended 30 feet above Times Square. The new outdoor stage will be the only of its kind located in Times Square.

TSX Broadway retail section rendering. Image: TSX Broadway.

Nearby the Times Square Theater, which has been vacant for 30 years, will be redeveloped as a large retail venue. Architecture and planning firm Beyer Blinder Belle will restore most of the existing building while adding in two glass stories.

Times Square Theater redevelopment rendering. Image: Stillman Development International.

New additions also include a glass box overhang on th...

WAF 2017 announces "Performance" as theme for this year's festival

2017-04-21T03:00:00-04:00

This post is brought to you by World Architecture Festival.

The only global festival that combines awards, live judging, conferences and networking, the World Architecture Festival, has announced "Performance" as the theme for its tenth anniversary edition.

The notion of "performance" in architecture will be central to this year's World Architecture Festival seminar programme. Plus, the architectural tours will also be focused on "performance," with visits to Berlin's top performance venues including Hans Scharoun's Berlin Philharmonie, which inspired the concept of listening to music in the round when it opened in 1963.

Revealing the theme for 2017, WAF Programme Director, Paul Finch, commented: "This year we will examine the multiple aspects of "performance" that architecture has to embrace: aesthetic, technical, economic, and psychological.

We will be discussing buildings designed for performance – for example, theaters and concert halls – but also the role that buildings play in th...

Hugh Hardy dies at the age of 84

2017-03-21T14:17:00-04:00

Hugh Hardy, the architect best-known for his renovation of many of New York’s most famous theatrical landmarks, passed away on Thursday at the age of 84 from a cerebral hemorrhage. He is survived by his wife, Tiziana Hardy.

Born on July 26, 1932 in Majorca, Spain to American parents, Hardy was raised primarily in New York. He attended Princeton where he earned a bachelor’s degree in 1954 and a master of fine arts degree in 1956. Hardy served as a drafting instructor in the Army Corps of Engineers before working with Jo Mielziner, a theatrical and set designer.

Among Hardy’s many restoration and renovation projects are the New Victory Theater, the Majestic Theater, the Central Synagogue, the Rainbow Room at Rockefeller Center and the Windows of the World at the top of the World Trade Center. Other notable projects include the Orchestra Hall in Minneapolis, as well as the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), the Claire Tow Theater and 420 West 42nd Street, all in New York.

Hardy headed thre...

Haworth Tompkins’ Everyman Theatre wins the RIBA Stirling Prize 2014

2014-10-17T14:30:00-04:00

Haworth Tompkins architects spent nine years transforming the rundown historic Everyman Theatre in Liverpool into the building it is today. Those nine years were well worth it, as Haworth Tompkins just won the prestigious RIBA Stirling Prize 2014 for the UK's best new building of the year.

Find more photos and project details on Bustler.

Previously: 2014 RIBA Stirling Prize shortlist is revealed

A closer look at UNStudio’s new Theatre de Stoep in Spijkenisse, The Netherlands

2014-10-14T14:05:00-04:00

In the Dutch town of Spijkenisse, the Theatre de Stoep designed by UNStudio recently celebrated its grand public opening, not long after the theater was completely realized. Inspired by the type of liveliness only experienced through live theater performances, the new cultural theater features undulating edges and a striking color palette of white and vivid purple, and circular LED lights on its façade.

Check out a timelapse video of the theater's construction below. More details about the project on Bustler.

Tour the spectacular new Mariinsky Theatre with architect Jack Diamond

2013-05-01T13:50:00-04:00

It may seem surprising that a Canadian was chosen to design a Russian state-funded match for the historic Mariinsky Theatre. Gergiev, general and artistic director of the theatre, visited Diamond’s Four Seasons Centre, home of the Canadian Opera Company in Toronto, and was wowed. When Gergiev and Diamond met for dinner the following year, the two saw eye to eye on everything from acoustics to street continuity.

Jack Diamond, of Diamond Schmitt Architects, takes CBC on a tour of the new Mariinsky Theatre, to open tomorrow in St. Petersburg.

More about the Mariinsky II can be found on D+S's website.

Rafael Viñoly Takes The Opera Stage

2011-07-27T12:52:00-04:00

Last week the architect Rafael Viñoly was speaking—not kindly—about colleagues of his who think they can do things besides make buildings. “This is a profession,” he said dryly, “that generates an enormous amount of arrogance.”

“Architects feel empowered to give opinions about politics and sociology and philosophy without knowing much about it,” Mr. Viñoly said by phone from Beijing, where his firm is building an engineering school. “Kind of in the same way that they think they can design furniture or fashion or utensils for dining. I think architects tend to believe that they can almost do anything, which is a wonderful characteristic, but in some cases you just fall flat. Theatrical design is just a completely different vocabulary. It’s a very, very difficult thing to do well.”

Toronto: From Civic to Culture

2006-04-08T10:46:00-04:00

Chris Hume delcares a renaissance in Toronto, but is unmoved by the new (Mall-like) Four Seasons Peforming Arts Centre. | thestar

by Diamond Schmitt