Designs for a brand new concert hall at Oxford University have been unveiled, adding an elegant new music venue to the centuries-old campus thanks to a £150 million ($209 million) gift.
The proposed new Stephen A. Schwarzman Center for the Humanities has three distinct performance spaces varying in size and is currently undergoing a second public consultation on the new building’s design before plans are formally submitted to Oxford City Council in the fall.
Hopkins Architects are behind the scheme for the new concert hall, which will have separate 500-, 250-, and 100-seat spaces and will provide a much-needed upgrade to the existing venues on campus, of which some can recall fondly performances from bygone luminaries such as Handel.
The Center will also serve as the new home for Oxford’s history and humanities faculties. Furthermore, it will feature a dedicated humanities library and new Institute for Ethics in AI, forming an overall plan that the university says will “demonstrate the essential role of the humanities in helping society confront and answer fundamental questions of the 21st century.”
“Soon Oxford will have a building specifically designed both to foster a new way of working and to share its benefits as widely as possible,” former British Museum Director Neil MacGregor said in a statement. “The humanities are about the generosity of spirit. This supreme act of generosity will enrich the intellectual life of Oxford — far beyond the university — for decades to come.”
Plans for construction are already underway with an anticipated opening set for the 2024-25 academic year pending approval from the city.
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