project focus
Taking centre stage
Completed on time and in budget, the £112m
transformation of the Royal Shakespeare Theatre has created a space that its
namesake would recognise.
THE Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon has been transformed following a three and a half year construction project. Sitting on the banks of the River Avon, the site is the home of the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) as well as the Swan Theatre, which has also received a number of improvements. The RSC aims to connect people with
Shakespeare, engage with the world and make bold, progressive work. The Transformation project was designed to embody these principles and to bring and actors and audiences together. The brief for the design team, led by architects Bennetts Associates, was to create an environment that Shakespeare would recognise, while retaining the key Art Deco and Victorian elements of the building. The playwright wrote for a theatre in which actors and audiences shared the same space, and directors at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre have struggled to overcome the difficulties of its cinema-style auditorium ever since the theatre opened in 1932. A new 1040+ thrust stage auditorium where the audience sits on three sides of the stage was consequently at the heart of the £112.8m project. The new facility almost halves the distance from the stage to the furthest seat, which has reduced from 27m to 15m, to significantly improve the experience. The brief also sought to make the building more welcoming and accessible to attract a broad range of visitors, whether coming to see a show, walking along the river or enjoying a meal. To this end, a host of new spaces have been created and are shared with the Swan Theatre. These include the 150-cover Rooftop Restaurant with a double height ceiling and views over
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the River Avon, the Riverside Cafe and Terrace and an exhibition space. The Colonnade is a new entrance to the
theatres and home to the box office and shop. It links the Royal Shakespeare and Swan Theatres for the first time, so they can both be accessed without people going outside. The Tower is another new entrance. Partly inspired by the original Victorian Memorial Theatre water tower, which was gutted by fire in 1926, the tower is 36m tall and has a 32m high viewing platform offering views across Stratford- upon-Avon. The Tower is constructed from thick, load-bearing walls around a central concrete lift shaft and slopes gently at a three-degree angle. Other new spaces include Weston
Square, a public outdoor space, which will host music, performances and events.
Key challenges Creating a modern performance centre in the shell of a Grade II* listed building in a highly sensitive location presented a number of challenges. One of the greatest was the design and construction of a 7m deep basement to allow actors, scenery and props to rise from beneath the stage during a production without being seen in advance from the galleries. Both theatres were originally constructed with knowledge of flood levels experienced in Stratford and consequently thresholds for both are well above flood levels experienced in the past. But the basement has been
constructed below the ground water level. Engineers Buro Happold used a
technique of interlocking reinforced concrete piles with a waterproof lining wall to form the basement box. The 1.7m thick concrete base slab and walls of interlocking piles stabilise the area and prevent ground water pressure from lifting the basement floor. The new basement is designed to resist 750 tonnes of uplift from surrounding ground water.
the project aims to bring actors and audiences together
A number of features have been included in the Royal Shakespeare Theatre to reduce the carbon footprint of the transformed building. Large parts of the building are naturally ventilated, including foyer spaces, restaurant, shot and back-of-house spaces. The Royal Shakespeare Theatre and Swan auditoria are ventilated using a virtually silent and efficient displacement system which brings fresh air in under the seating and minimises cooling requirements. Hot air is extracted at the top of the auditoria, where useful heat is recovered from the exhaust air using plate heat exchangers. The heat recovered from extracted auditorium air is used to preheat the incoming external fresh air, serving the auditorium to the required audience
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