performance venues


Rooftop views of the city from the Leeds College of Music


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EEDS College of Music is revamping its main performance space with a new rooftop extension.


The contemporary design by architects


Group Ginger, will provide a striking addition to the city’s architecture. The new space will be enclosed with a full perimeter glazed screen allowing visitors views across Leeds, whilst a glazed attic will be shaded by black and gold vertical louvres. “We approached the roof top extension


as though we were completing the building and providing the penthouse accommodation that was missing from the original,” says Simon Baker from Group Ginger. “We always look to celebrate the user and the activity in the space; it was important that this space expressed the creativity of the college students but also engaged with the surrounding city skyline. We like to think of it as though it could be a piano bar or lounge in New York.”


Due for completion in September, the


extension will create an enhanced audience experience at the conservatoire’s 350-seat venue. The 2,150 sq ft space will include breakout rooms and dedicated catering areas in order to facilitate the programme of performance, conferences and educational events.


www.groupginger.com


Arts building conceived as an elevated translucent box on black brickwork plinth


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PERFORMING arts centre is one of two new stand-alone buildings at Redbridge College in Romford.


The £5m Box Theatre comprises music


recording studios and teaching spaces as well as a 264-seat performance space which doubles as a multi-purpose hall with retractable seating for enrolment, exhibitions and gatherings. Designed by Ayre Chamberlain Gaunt


(ACG) as part of a masterplan study for the college, the BREEAM ‘Excellent’ building is conceived as an elevated translucent box sitting on a plinth of black brickwork. Translucent polycarbonate rainscreen


panels from Rodeca create a vibrant façade. More than 300 sqm of Rodeca's 40mm wall cladding panels in Kristall and Bi-Colors Kristall/yellow and Kristall/green were used to vertically clad the first floor. The façade is back-lit with low-level lighting and integrated signage. The


reception areas sits within a double-height foyer area, creating the new entrance and updated public face of the college. A 15m redundant boiler chimney which


is a significant presence on the site could not be removed so the college decided to make it a positive feature and turn it into a marker beacon. The top is clad in the same colours as the façade, with backlit signage to advertise the college, and the brickwork has been painted dark grey to complement the other rainscreen cladding on the Box Theatre. ACG's Dominic Gaunt said: "The


performance block creates a new public face to the college which suffered from a poor public presence on its street frontage, being accessed between residential buildings and all but invisible from the heath opposite. Our design established it as a marker building, drawing people into the site and giving the college a visible


highereducationestates 21 presence from the street.”


www.acgarchitects.co.uk www.rodeca.co.uk


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